20 rail carriages bought for €44m lying in storage

More than 20 Irish Rail train carriages bought from a Japanese company for €44m are sitting in storage and are unlikely to be used for years to come, it has emerged.

TDs deemed the situation a complete waste of taxpayers’ money yesterday after it emerged the mini-fleet of carriages were sitting idle because of a lack of passenger numbers.

But members of the Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee insisted that the Government would not have had to bail out cash-strapped Irish Rail last year if the trains had been sold.

National Transport Authority (NTA) chief executive officer Gerry Murphy told the committee that the train carriages were purchased at a cost of around €2m each in late-2008.

They formed part of a total €500m contract with the Japanese firm Mitsui for four deliveries of carriages. The last 21 train cars remain unused because of the fall in passenger numbers, Mr Murphy said.

The orders were made by Irish Rail after Goodbody consultants made predictions of growth for the transport group, anticipating that passenger numbers could double or triple in some circumstances, the committee heard.

But Irish Rail user numbers had actually fallen by 17% since 2008, TDs heard.

PAC chairman John McGuinness questioned why Irish Rail had been trusted to make the purchases when their accounts had been “in such a mess”.

“A company in the private sector would be broke if they did that,” he said

The Fianna Fáil TD said the situation reflected “gross inefficiencies” on behalf of the company.

He accused the NTA of ignoring the problems and instead agreeing to fare increases for Irish Rail.

“You should instead be saying ‘get your house in order’,” he demanded, saying that Irish Rail “had squandered” Irish taxpayers’ money.

But the NTA chief executive defended funds being pumped into Irish Rail saying that public transport needed to be subsidised and that the company was making savings. Staff had been reduced by almost 2,000 to 4,200 in eight years and revenue in areas, such as Galway, was up 20%.

“They are not grossly inefficient, these organisations,” replied Mr Murphy.

Fine Gael TD Kieran O’Donnell questioned why the unused train carriages were not sold last year. He pointed out that €19m of the €36m bailout given by the state to CIE had gone to Irish Rail.

It was not sustainable to have €44m of Irish taxpayers money “sitting idly by in a carriage graveyard”, Mr O’Donnell said.

However, Mr Murphy said that passenger numbers were expected to rise and that the carriages had a rail life of 20 to 30 years.

Irish Rail said yesterday that the train cars were fully functional but beyond their operating needs at present.

Controversial comments

Food on Irish Rail trains is of a third world standard and their mobile phone and broadband coverage is a joke, a Government TD has argued.

An irate Kieran O’Donnell made the controversial comments to the Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee yesterday.

The Fine Gael Limerick City TD asked transport chiefs why services were not up to standard like other countries.

Mr O’Donnell said Irish Rail had no hope of attracting business customers when basics like food and internet access on carriages was substandard.

He said that broadband and mobile phone coverage on the train carriage journeys were a “joke.”

The quality of the food most of the time was “third world,” he added, saying that it was mostly just tea and sandwiches that passengers could choose from on long journeys.

Mr O’Donnell said that travelling by train was the nicest form of travel, but that Irish Rail would have difficulty attracting business customers with the low-quality service.

National Transport Authority officials said they frequently monitored the quality of services and that the standard of mobile phone coverage on board carriages varied from one county to the next.

The authority yesterday also said it had no role in monitoring accusations of racism against Irish taxi drivers.

Dublin South East TD Eoghan Murphy said there were incidents of racism against non-Irish drivers. But the authority said it had no authority or role in preventing such situations.

Irish Rail said yesterday that third party companies operated the broadband and food services on its trains.

— Juno McEnroe