Bus policy will benefit taxpayer and consumer

DEPUTY Seán Crowe’s letter (Irish Examiner, August 31) begins by correctly identifying the central issue in the recent bus controversy — provision of investment in new buses and services. Unfortunately, from that point on, logic deserts him.

The Government has committed to further investment in buses, linked to reform of the market in the interest of the taxpayer and the consumer.

Does Sinn Féin support continued funding of an inefficient Dublin Bus that won’t tell the taxpayer what it has done with money already received, with services making a loss despite massive subsidy and a monopoly position, and which has lost millions of passengers? Mr Crowe asks me to examine the facts, and recognise the British experience of franchising has been a ‘disaster’. I agree with Mr Crowe — that is why we reject any notion of introducing that system here. Sinn Féin, to quote Mr Crowe, “would do well to examine the evidence”.