Saturday, May 11, 2013

A Monopoly on Wheels

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11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Any administration with foresight and vision would have a long time ago sought out, with 170 thousand plus population, a back-up system in a case where the bus owners want to hold the island ransom.

Now that we have better road network, thanks in part to the SLP, people are working from various locations around the island which are far from their homes. Sometimes it takes some three different buses just in order to get to homes.

Our beloved drug barons and drug lords are making personal and public safety much more difficult, with increasing drug dependency, narcotic sales and associated criminal activity.

The minibus system is generally more economical than larger buses in terms of operating costs. It should be retained. Our non-existent energy policy will not help the transportation sector in the foreseeable future.

However, a complementary government fleet to take care of students and pupils, appears as just one viable response to the problem.

But because government faces a possibility of a unionized workforce in transportation, that must be anticipated with a legislative response with respect to essential services and binding arbitration.

May 11, 2013 at 4:16 PM
Anonymous said...

Again, the elephant in the room is that we have a public transportation system ran by private bus owners. This dichotomy was bound to pose problems. A government fleet of buses is advisable.

SLU needs a terminal with a functioning ticketing office to dispense bus passes/cards. (Sections of Conway and the under-utilized Methodist School may have to go.) This would be in lieu of money going directly to drivers--posing a threat to their safety. A "no change" policy can also be adopted, thereby reducing wait times.

May 11, 2013 at 9:14 PM
Anonymous said...

Another slap in the faces of those who pay income taxes: These PRIVATE bus owners have even set up a PRIVATE auto shop with PUBLIC funds. While they continue to hold the people ransom for fare hikes, yes, rebates are welcome!

May 12, 2013 at 12:57 AM
Anonymous said...

Sorry for my ignorance, what are viaments?

May 12, 2013 at 7:09 AM
Anonymous said...

A gov run system..What have you been smoking..

The Bds Government has a mill stone around their neck the transport board..Slu can learn from that.

You can not raise the cost of everything and then expect the bus operators to keep fares the same it simply does not work that way.

Tyres,Gas,Spare parts have all gone up significantly. Labour also.

The Industry needs proper regulation I agree .

For starters you can not buy a route band for $500 and sell for $30,000.

Regulation.

May 12, 2013 at 8:50 AM
Anonymous said...

You're suggesting fare hikes in much the same way private sector wages have increased? Because that's what fares are--salaries. Except, the private sector receives no rebates from the government, and most workers are not unionized and cannot hold employers to ransom for wage hikes.

From what I understand, there may be a 40% fare hike in longer routes; from $2.50 to $3.50 in some instances. Failure of one government's system is no indication of failure for all. There are efficiently run public transport systems the world over.

May 12, 2013 at 11:12 AM
Anonymous said...

Regulation.

Show me 1 effectively run public transport system in the small islands in the Caribbean ?

I didnt for 1 sec suggest the fares proposed are what they should be.

Nothing tried nothing lost or gained.

Our system can work it needs proper regluation.

As for subsidies I do not agree with any . It all has to be market driven.

May 12, 2013 at 12:01 PM
Anonymous said...

For all the budget hot air in the past and today, neither of the parties have within their members especially, the idiots that have been repeatedly been voted in who at best can only just parrot 'Mr Speaker.... Mr Speaker...', have based or demanded that other members base their arguments on real cost of living indices.

The blokes do not know any better.

So they are all happily shooting shate most of the time.

May 12, 2013 at 12:23 PM
Anonymous said...

Show me 1 effectively run public transport system in the small islands in the Caribbean?
_______________________
You might as well have added ... "that's 238sq miles". You've resorted to a tactic employed by most--if not all--of our petulant politicians. If you cannot win the argument through gross generalizations, significantly lower the benchmarks. Truth is if you insist on comparing yourself to crap, you never rise any higher.

May 12, 2013 at 9:57 PM
Anonymous said...

Again, the elephant in the room is that we have a public transportation system ran by private bus owners. This dichotomy was bound to pose problems.
_______________________________

Oh dear! Oh dear! Looks like someone is getting smothered in the semantics. The word ‘public’ in ‘public transportation’ could well have been replaced with the word 'mass’ as in ‘mass transportation'.

The assets in use in that sector do not belong to the general public or citizenry, or to the government as the representative of the people in any way. The related transportation entity does not have parliamentary legislative sanction (i.e., it was not created by an act of parliament), nor was what remains a sector with high atomistic competition is, in any way, government owned. Therefore, it is misleading to suggest or associate government ownership.

There may be added confusion because the group gets a government subsidy. But to equate the granting of a subsidy as equivalent to the establishment of some kind of equity, which translates into part ownership or ownership rights is again wrong.

Subsidies, as a part or subset of government fiscal policy, are aimed at incentivizing or encouraging specific types of economic activity. Taxes or penalties do the opposite.

The differential way in which the VAT was implemented shows a lack of understanding of what a VAT in our neck of the woods is supposed to do, or to achieve.

It is not supposed to operate as just another tax, or just another layer of taxation, but a simplification of the tax code and system. Having more than one numerically-specified tax rate defeats that purpose as with the special rate for the hotel sector. It is a return to spaghetti-type tax legislation that the VAT was supposed to reduce or eliminate.

Yet, it is understood that the government wanted to ensure that it did not kill the goose that laid the golden eggs in our case; it lowered and created a special 8 percent rate for the hotel sector. But this differential treatment, in effect, represents a subsidy to the hotel sector.

Does that mean that the hotel sector has become “public” since that time? Public transportation means no more than transportation used by the general public. There is always a debate regarding its nationalization, meaning, it being taken over by the government.

Some of our guys are already salivating at the opportunities for additional political mischief.

The question remains that if after some 30 years of independence, we can hardly run our own central government with any semblance of decency, efficiency and effectiveness, [our known and more recent financial blunders providing ample testimony], why burden this and future administrations with another sector, so pregnant with the potential for more financial mayhem and mismanagement?

May 13, 2013 at 7:24 AM
Anonymous said...

Aha! Thanks for the elucidation. I figured that "public" may be interpreted as "mass" earlier, though. However, it became confusing when I realized the amount of power the GOSL seems to exercise over that sector--the provision of rebates, the existence of a Public Transport Board (which I believed to be a government arm), and the approval or disapproval of fare increases. At the very least, it appeared to be some sort of public-private hybrid.

May 13, 2013 at 11:15 AM

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