New broom at the RPA

strassenwolf

RTE website wrote:

New chairman for Railway Procurement Agency
Wednesday, 7 February 2007 19:46
The Minister for Transport, Martin Cullen, has appointed Tom Mulcahy as the new chairman of the Railway Procurement Agency.

Mulcahy, who is a former chairman of Aer Lingus and a former chief executive of AIB, takes over from Padraic White.

White has served as chairman of the Railway Procurement Agency since its inception in 2001 and his five-year term of office has concluded.

Mulcahy will also be the chairman designate of the new Dublin Transport Authority. This means that he will be responsible for putting in place the necessary organisational arrangements for the new authority.

http://www.rte.ie/business/2007/0207/rpa.html

Presumably Mr White's objections to the RPA being effectively subsumed into the DTA didn't help his chances of getting a further contract. It doesn't sound like Mr Mulcahy is going to be so troublesome.

strassenwolf

The Indo's story is a bit juicier...

Cullen gives top job to tax scandal bank chief

Martin Cullen, has appointed Tom Mulcahy to head up two transport bodies

Former AIB boss takes charge at transport authorities

EMBATTLED Transport Minister Martin Cullen has appointed a former AIB boss at the centre of a tax scandal as head of two high-profile transport authorities.

Tom Mulcahy retired as chairman of Aer Lingus after he was identified in an investigation as having had "tax issues". Now that he is back in the public eye, he is sure to come under inevitable pressure to clarify what these issues were.

Mr Mulcahy was one of several senior AIB executives who had to make a settlement with the Revenue Commissioners.

He retired after seven years as chief executive in AIB and became chairman of Aer Lingus in August 2001. He stood down three years ago when it emerged he had to make the tax settlement.

Yesterday, Mr Mulcahy was appointed chairman of the new Dublin Transport Authority and the Railway Procurement Agency.

The appointment, suggested by Mr Cullen, was ratified by the Cabinet on Tuesday.

The Dublin Transport Authority will have sweeping powers to reform transport in the entire Dublin region. He will be responsible for running the new body which is responsible for the management of buses, LUAS and Metro across the greater Dublin region.

Mr Cullen said last night: "I am confident that Tom Mulcahy will build on the progress made and will continue to drive forward the Transport 21 agenda."

Asked about the past tax controversy, a department spokesperson said: "Tom Mulcahy is one of Ireland's leading businessmen and is the best person to chair both the RPA and the DTA at this critical stage of their development." Mr Mulcahy takes over as head of the RPA from Padraic White, who publicly opposed the decision by the minister to merge the RPA with the DTA.

Mr White said: "The RPA board did not see the sense nor the logic of that new organisation doing what the RPA was already doing successfully. It is a matter of regret that it was not possible to have a meaningful dialogue on the RPA board's proposals."

Mr Mulcahy was one of two unnamed former executives the bank said had "tax issues" in May 2004.

His name subsequently emerged in the media and, despite issuing a statement claiming that he was tax compliant, Mr Mulcahy stepped down as chairman of Aer Lingus.

News that Mr Mulcahy had to make a settlement with the Revenue Commisioners leaked into the media at the same time as a string of former AIB executives were found to have benefitted from separate Virgin Islands company Faldor. Mr Mulcahy was not part of the Faldor arrangements.

But it emerged he also had tax issues to settle and decided to resign from his position as chairman of Aer Lingus.

Mr Cullen has been involved in a number of high-profile controversies, including the €52m spent on electronic voting machines which are still gathering dust.

Treacy Hogan

---

The right track record for rail and transport

TRANSPORT Minister Martin Cullen is courting controversy in appointing Tom Mulcahy as chairman of the Railway Procurement Agency and chairman designate of the Dublin Transport Authority.

But if he wants a job done, he has probably picked the right man.

Mr Mulcahy became chairman of Aer Lingus on September 1st, 2004, after the tragic death of businessman Bernie Cahill in a drowning accident. Ten days later, the planes ploughed into the Twin Towers and the airline industry was in crisis.

Aer Lingus was losing €25m a day. It did not even have a chief executive and, after 9/11, several likely candidates turned down offers from Mr Mulcahy, before the job went to the former pilot Willy Walsh.

Together with a small group of senior executives, they rescued the State airline from bankruptcy in a cost-cutting exercise which involved 2,000 job losses.

In some ways, it was a greater achievement than Mr Mulcahy's successful stint as chief executive of AIB, which saw the bank expand. But it all came crashing down in 2004.

Investigations into AIB's handling of overseas accounts uncovered what Mr Mulcahy called "tax issues" on funds he held abroad. He made a settlement with the Revenue, but decided to resign as chairman of the airline, and from the board of another company, to save them from bad publicity.

It was the right thing to do, and he did it promptly. It appeared to be a sad end to a brilliant career; it seems it is not quite over yet. In that case perhaps it would have been better if Mr Mulcahy had explained the "tax issues" in more detail. Perhaps he still should. If the "issues" turn out to be relatively minor, commuters might well be willing to forgive, to get a better transport system.

BRENDAN KEENAN

http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=9&si=1771799&issue_id=15226

D'Peoples Voice

To be fair, I don't think anyone can say they did things perfectly throughout their lives. Given his position in AIB he should have known better!

The main thing is he has paid back the money,
ok I would have liked to have seen him go to prison to pay back his debt to society, but at least he owes nothing to the Revenue.

AlekSmart

Its not all bad though...The Brit`s have had it all their own way for too long with Two-Jags Prescott......Now we have a chance to hit back with Two-Jobs Tom Mulcahy !!!

I wonder what impact the EU 48 Hr working-time directive will have on the lad....24 hours each week to Sort Out Dublins Transportation AND Procure a Railway.

It kinda shows you what Priority our Govt really allocates to Transport......and Banking !! :eek:

dowlingm

bad call. In a system like Dublin with multiple operators, a body such as DTA should be neutral rather than wholly or partly controlling one of the operators (RPA) which will lead to complaints from Aircoach, DB, IE etc. of differential treatment.

As for Mulcahy - he has to own up to the tax stuff and take his lumps. If the Dept of Ag is clawing back farmer's cheques for being behind in tax the least Mulcahy can do is be honest about his situation when about to receive a huge taxpayer funded salary from his posts as head of DTA & RPA.

MarkoP11

Given the RPA and DTA will be one and the same it makes no difference

DTA will hold the service agreement contracts

monument

dowlingm wrote:

bad call. In a system like Dublin with multiple operators, a body such as DTA should be neutral rather than wholly or partly controlling one of the operators (RPA) which will lead to complaints from Aircoach, DB, IE etc. of differential treatment.

Does the plain not involve DB and IE being partly assimilated by the DTA? Or was that watered down?

icdg

monument wrote:

Does the plain not involve DB and IE being partly assimilated by the DTA? Or was that watered down?

Alas it seems that bit has been watered down alright - IE and DB will apparently now work under contract to the DTA but will otherwise remain as is.

Whatever about the merits of this, it would have been lunacy keeping both the DTA and RPA. Essentially it would been one state board directing another state board to direct a private company. The RPA would be reduced to middleman between the DTA and Veolia and to be honest what would be the benifit of that over having the DTA deal with Veolia directly? It would become an unnecessary layer of bureaucracy.

For me, the DTA should be an authority keeping a tight leash over all the operating companies - Irish Rail, Dublin Bus, Veolia, and whoever the tube operator ends up being. And for goodness sake a single branding is needed, with a recognisable logo for Dublin, just as the Transport for London logo is used accross London's Buses, the Tube, and DLR among others. And a single ticketing structure. The operators should operate - according to getting the best value for the taxpayer - but the DTA should be in the driving seat.

dowlingm

Marko - do I understand correctly that DTA will have planning control of routes for all buses and running metro+LUAS from the RPA side of DTA? Why not give them at least DB as well if that's the case - DB will find a way to run rings around DTA otherwise.

Victor

I'm not sure if merging the DTA and the RPA is a good idea. While conscious of not having too many layers, there is too much going on for one organisation to deal with. Smart card is the ignored child of the RPA, while sexy, shiny, golden child* Metro takes the limelight.

Having a tax cheat run an organisation dispensing billion euro contracts is ..... so Fianna Fail.




* I know, I know, technically Luas is the Golden Child.

monument

Victor wrote:

there is too much going on for one organisation to deal with.

Why or how?

Victor

monument wrote:

Why or how?

Look at how progress was lost on Smart Card and Metro (and Luas BX) while they were working to finish Luas A+B.

Compare them with the NRA, who only have to deal with councils (typically one per project) and not a bunch of squabbling, potentially litigious competitiors. Both of course will have to deal with the public and contractors. Look at the lack of progress that the NRA have made. The "intercity motorways" (due for completion 2006) won't actually all be motorways, will be 250% of budget or more and 5-6 years late.

monument

Victor wrote:

Look at how progress was lost on Smart Card and Metro (and Luas BX) while they were working to finish Luas A+B.

If the needed resources aren’t put in, or heads not knocked together, it wouldn’t matter if theses projects were handled by one agency or five.

I cant see how you’re making a case for there to be two agencies with overlapping powers and one just telling the other what to do.

Victor

monument wrote:

If the needed resources aren’t put in, or heads not knocked together

But if you only have one agency doing "everything" only the things that are liked by the board of that agency will get done. There will be no heads knocked together.

However if the RPA remains as a procurement agency, primarily for capital projects, then the DTA can concentrate on making everything work together. Also there are ideological differences between the existing agencies and someone needs to play referee. Do you think Mary, Miniature and Cullen have been good referees?

monument

Victor wrote:

But if you only have one agency doing "everything" only the things that are liked by the board of that agency will get done. There will be no heads knocked together.

However if the RPA remains as a procurement agency, primarily for capital projects, then the DTA can concentrate on making everything work together. Also there are ideological differences between the existing agencies and someone needs to play referee. Do you think Mary, Miniature and Cullen have been good referees?

No, not at all. That problem needs to be taken out of the equation. In other words, the DTA should have total planning, ticketing, and marketing control of DB, Luas, Metro, Dart and Commuter services.

That’s generally the way it’s done internationally, isn’t it?