However, it is understood the company does not plan any job losses as a a result of the route closures. Instead, it is understood Bus Éireann is planning an expansion of its operations in Cork, Galway, Limerick and Waterford, where it offers city services.
john boye wrote: » When people start saying Michael O'Leary should run xyz I just stop listening.
Yyhhuuu wrote: » The likes of Michael O Leary should run the CIE group and refuse to engage with unions. Look at the dire financial state of the group which pre-dates covid. It may have to close entirely if its precarious financial position continues.
Yyhhuuu wrote: » The unions should be got rid of.
Yyhhuuu wrote: » I have seen multiple examples of poor customer service from BE drivers both Exprssway and City services. There is a problem. It would not be acceptable in many private operators. It seems BE is so highly unionised and I am assuming it's a far more secure job with BE than with a private operator. Is it true BE drivers are highly remunerated?
Yyhhuuu wrote: » He should do a Thatcher on it and refuse to engage.
GT89 wrote: » Staff turnover would go through the roof
GT89 wrote: » and service will deteriorate as a result.
He said that Bus Éireann's board had made the decision to manage resources by pulling out of four routes and consolidating 14 routes.
He said other operators are on the routes they have pulled out of and the Government support for Bus Éireann and other public transport operators will not preclude it supporting other services who need licenses.
He said that the company is committed to expanding and has plans to introduce new services in Galway, Limerick, Cork, Navan and parts of Meath as well as to hire more drivers.
salonfire wrote: » No harm to lose some of the dinosours in Bus Eireann. Fresh blood might improve their reputation.
I don't think anyone would notice if the service deteriorates further.
GT89 wrote: » And you can blame that on the government for not giving the right amount of investment in the service for the poor service. The only way to improve public transport is to invest in it.
GT89 wrote: » But none of them pay as well as state owned operators
GT89 wrote: » Which one? It's not only basic pay there's other benefits too mind you with CIE companies like pensions, sick pay, overtime rates and sunday premium, free GP etc.
bk wrote: » How is this a costly mistake?! As I detailed above, most of these routes already have other companies serving them, so they won't need much in the way of any extra PSO subsidy or services to serve them. The only one that doesn't have service is some of the towns on the X8. And frankly if I was the NTA I'd just offer a license to Aircoach/Gobus or any other company who might want the route. I suspect it is a busy enough route that some one will be willing to make a go at it, even without PSO money. The private operators increased capacity on our intercity routes 5 to 6 fold and did it at zero cost to the taxpayer. It has been a major win both for the taxpayer and the users of these services.
salonfire wrote: » As we've seen with Bus Eireann strikes, they don't hang around to act as a "service to the community" when time comes to try line their own pockets with unjustifiable pay claims.
john boye wrote: » I don't want to go down an endless private v public rabbit hole but; The privateers got out as soon as covid hit and the fares dried up. BE kept their show on the road on a reduced schedule through emergency funding. Now the funding is stopping and BE are getting out too. So what's the difference?
IE 222 wrote: » I don't see the benefit in allowing private operators to come in and pick the low lying fruit while the tax payer covers the costly parts. BE services wouldn't need to be PSO routes if the NTA limited the number of non stop services on a route.
bk wrote: » But that isn't the case for these services. We are talking about Expressway here, the commercial arm of BE. They are no different then any other commercial company. That means they don't get any investment from the government. If they want to improve services, then they go get business loans from a bank just like any of the other commercial operators. And if anything they have an advantage over the others, being a semi-state I'm sure they could get loans more easily and at better rates. Over the past 15 years we have seen the commercial operators invest 10's of millions in improving their services. New routes, more departures, new coaches, wifi, toilets, modern ticketing, etc. In the same period we saw very little in the way of investment or innovation from BE. No new routes, little in the way of improvements in schedules, dragging their feet on innovations like toilets, wifi, etc. Frankly BE's issues go much deeper. The old excuse of the government didn't give us enough money is an excuse used by poorly run and managed companies IME.
GT89 wrote: » There has been a lack of investment in Bus Eireann services. With PSO services the blame falls on the government and with Expressway services the blame falls on Bus Eireann themselves. However that's not taking from the point that some Expressway routes should really be PSO services due to a lack of alternatives. That's where there's an issue with a lack of investment.
devnull wrote: » So on one hand you're saying that the state operators pay better and have benefits such as pensions, sick pay, overtime rates and sunday premium, free GP etc and you are lauding them for this,..... ....but on the other hand you complain that they do not have enough money in which to fund their daily operations, without recognising that there might be a connection. You appear to be suggesting that when it comes to a choice to giving the staff the things you mention or funding the operations of a quality public transport service, that the company has chosen to spend it's money on staff rather than spend the money on the services they are paid to provide. Any company in any industry who is paying it's staff over market rate and is also offering them more perks than the rest of the market, that then says they do not have enough money to actually spend on it's day to day operations needs to examine how they are spending their money. The problem with CIE companies is that if the companies were given even more investment is that a lot of that money sloshing around would end up in employees back pockets rather than being used to improve services. You can be sure that the unions would want a slice of that pie and already their wages and perks are way above the market rate. The other ironic thing is when you see the left and certain union figures come out with the usual soundbites, often they mention how Dublin Bus and Bus Eireann have a modern fleet and was way ahead of the game in relation to converting to a fully wheelchair accessible fleet. With the next breath they state that there has been a 'lack of investment' which is a massive contradiction. It's a simple equation really, the more you spend on staff and wages, the less you have to spend on the service itself. The problem with BE has always seemed to be that the balance between how much is spent on staff terms and conditions and how much is spent on the service is wrong.
IE 222 wrote: » I don't see the benefit in allowing private operators to come in and pick the low lying fruit while the tax payer covers the costly parts. BE services wouldn't need to be PSO routes if the NTA limited the number of non stop services on a route. There is also the huge reduction in capacity and frequency of services should BE exit the markets. Private operators will be very selective of what additional, if any, capacity/frequency they will want to include. Again it doesn't take much for a private operator to withdraw services like we've seen during covid. A large percentage of their business relies on airport passengers. I think we'll see a considerable amount of scaling back of their services also until air travel picks back up. The more revenue earning services BE lose out on the more costly operating costs become for them which results in other PSO routes becoming more costly. I can't see any benefit in shrinking or limiting BE routes.
GT89 wrote: » The drivers are not highly paid in most cases they get a fair days wage for a fair days work. Other operators have much more of an issue with staff retention than Bus Eireann. If BE were to pay their staff less and give less benefits then staff turnover would go up meaning the money they save by paying staff less would have to be spent on recruitment and training.
Do you have evidence that CIE companies are giving money to staff ahead of investing in services. Especially now that on PSO services the NTA give operators money and in return certain minimum standards have to be met.
devnull wrote: » Where would these staff go to? If they are career or long serving bus drivers and Bus Eireann are paying the most and they tone down the packages so BE were still offering the best package but less than they are now, then they are not going to get a better paid job elsewhere? I assume you would suggest that they would leave the industry? I know of plenty of privates who pay less than Bus Eireann (but still well above minimum wage) who have no real problems holding onto staff. If BE were still offering a better package and a better work environment and higher pay, then surely they would have an even better chance of holding onto their staff than the companies who pay less who have no real staff turnover problem?
If any business in a commercial environment in any industry is unable to fund daily operations then it needs to take a look at it's spending and compare that to other companies in the same industry and see if it is overspending anywhere. This is basic business finance management and is nothing like rocket science. By your own admission Bus Eireann are able to pay their staff higher wages and give them vastly more perks than anyone else yet according to you they cannot afford to run their services properly. For every single cent on staff costs, that is a cent less to be spend on other areas of the business so of course staff costs come into how much investment they need, it's basic economics. If you look across the CIE companies and their accounts, the one cost that looks completely out of whack with their competitors is staffing costs. The higher your staff costs, the bigger chunk of your income that goes on them, which reduces the money for everything else, which means that you require extra investment to cover the shortfall. As I said though a lot of the discussion on this topic is going to be moot anyway, because the whole thing is almost certainly political posturing ahead of the budget. That's why they're talking about withdrawing the services when the government support runs out. If it wasn't about political posturing they'd be withdrawing them already or have waited until much nearer the time.
bk wrote: » I'm sorry but that is a nonsense argument. Again these are Expressway routes. They are run on a commercial basis, no different then any other commercial operator. Money from these Expressway routes don't subsidise PSO services. BE are supposed to keep them as completely separate operations, with separation of accounting, etc. As a commercial operator BE were entitled to go for the direct, non-stop route licenses and invest in those new routes, the same as any other operator. But instead they sat around, did nothing and left more innovative companies come in. BTW are you really suggesting that after the government spent 10 billion building the new motorways, that they should have refused to issue any direct licenses, despite the obvious massive demand for it, just because it would impact BE's slow, indirect routes?! That would have been insane! The reality is once the motorways were built, there was always going to be new direct routes started up to use those motorways, that could never have been avoided. Public demand for them was too strong. And once started, they were obviously going to impact the now less popular stopping service. BE had the opportunity to go for those same direct licenses, but they never showed any interest in them. Though I'd point out Citylink, JJ Kavangh and DC all operate stopping services too and in some cases right beside their direct non stop services. So clearly such services can work, it is just that BE are a very inefficient, top heavy, operator and they don't seem to be able to make more marginal routes work.
bk wrote: » And to be clear about this. Of the 5 routes BE are pulling out of. 4 of them already have an alternative operator, so there will be no PSO costs at all related to these 4 routes. The 5th, the x8 is the only one with no alternative, but as I mentioned earlier, I'd suspect one of the 4 private operators in Cork will probably be very interested in taking it over, even without PSO subsidy. So really I don't see any extra PSO costs coming out of this change.
GT89 wrote: » You have to take other things in to consideration some companies can get away with having high staff turnover but others less so. Bus Eireann have a different business model than most private operators as they are providing PSO services in which they can be fined for not operating. Other operators don't have this issue to the same extent.
IE 222 wrote: » Do you honestly believe BE as a semi state operator would of been allowed to freely cull services to introduce non stop services without political or public outrage?
I'm not against non stop services but there needs to be a balance. Allowing non stop services to freely compete against stopping services is ridiculous. Should Irish Rail be allowed bring in their own separate non stop Dublin - Cork trains and scale back the current service or maybe Dublin Bus run all their Swords/North Dublin services via the port tunnel.
devnull wrote: » Which would suggest that Bus Eireann are trying to be a bit of a hybrid company and it might be worth the DB and BE commercial services being spun off into a new commercial arm of CIE with it's own infrastructure etc in much the same way that DB and BE are seperate companies. This would also help non regular bus users who do not know what the difference is between commercial services that are operated by Bus Eireann and the PSO services that are operated by them, because whilst the majority of frequent posts on this forum may know, your average person on the street may not. On the other hand Bus Eireann having a PSO side has probably been a big part in why the Expressway services kept running during COVID-19. If you've already got a depot open for the maintenance of PSO vehicles and PSO staff, running commercial vehicles out of that same depot is cheaper rather than than having to open the depot just for those routes.
IE 222 wrote: » Oh the private operators are going to take on and cover all the services BE are dropping.
LuasSimon wrote: » It’s fairly sad when the national bus carrier is cancelling routes between the big cities. The private operators all paying drivers minimum wage . We will be a nation of minimum wage employees soon . Everyone will need the government to provide housing for them as they’ll have no money to buy their own houses .
GT89 wrote: » I agree that Expressway should be spun off separately but consideration would have to given to the fact that alternative PSO services may have to provided in order to fill in gap left by Expressway services like the way M+A coaches were contracted to operate route 828 PSO to replace Bus Eireann's route 8.
The other about Expressway services is that as BE are a state owned company there is politics at play aswell as pure commercial motives. If BE were to break off the Expressway element as separate entity. The new entity would likely be commercial driven meaning it could be more likely to go out of business entirely or be changed majorly and likely sold off.
Political reasons is also likely the reason as to why Expressway continued to operate throughout lockdown but then again there were also some privates that kept going such as Matthews and Wexford Bus.
If say Expressway were to shut down in may cases alternarive PSO services would have to provided likely in the form of a more local based connecting a more rural area aith smaller towns and villages to the nearest large town where people can connect to trains and other bus services rather than having a direct Expressway service to Dublin. This would likely be unpopular as was bus connects as changing modes does not appear to go down well politcally as could be seen with bus connects in Dublin.
devnull wrote: » But at the end of the day on some of these routes the argument is that the services are perhaps closing because they are not commercially viable due to the low number of passengers traveling through the towns. That in itself pretty much suggests that these routes should be the exact kind of routes that should be getting PSO funding, since servicing such places is exactly the whole idea behind having PSO bus services.
But this is the harsh realities of operating in a commercial environment. It comes back to what I've said previously, namely that at times it feels like Bus Eireann want the benefits of being a commercial company and also the benefits of being a PSO company to apply to it's overall business. You cannot have your cake and eat it, as the Brits are finding out with Brexit.
Sure and I understand that, but as stated previously you cannot expect a small town with a couple of thousand people to have the same service as a city. I have family in rural Ireland, I love rural Ireland, but people have to accept that if you live in the middle of the countryside and you are not close to any city, you are not going to get the same service as a city does. You for sure deserve a service, and every town deserves a service where there is demand for such service but we also have to be realistic with what level of service that is. Localink has been a tremendous success in most places that it operates. Using local link as a feeder to longer distance routes, perhaps even making those routes town also stop at places such as hospitals en-route, opening up journey opportunities that currently don't exist (there are so many smaller places in Ireland where people have to get a taxi to the other end of the Town or the nearest hospital because there is no public transport) is also something that I would be very fond of.
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