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That much vaunted private sector efficiency… September 11, 2019

Posted by WorldbyStorm in Uncategorized.
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…AWOL in this instance. Private bus operator ‘Go-Ahead’ who run some routes in Dublin and who the NTA has decided not to fine despite complaints about:

…punctuality and buses failing to turn up.
Pensioners and children trying to the get to school were particularly affected [Richard Boyd Barrett] said. The most complained about routes, he added, were the number 59 from Dún Laoghaire to Killiney, the 63 from Dún Laoghaire to Kilternan and the 111 from Dalkey to Brides Glen.

The reason for the problems, according to Go-Ahead?

[it] attributed problems meeting its targets to “higher than expected driver resignations”.

Given this is a completely avoidable problem, since there was no pressing reason to open up these routes to private operators, it really is absurd. And as RBB notes, this is a service for which the operator is paid £125m over five years.

Comments»

1. John Goodwillie - September 11, 2019

It would be interesting to learn why there were higher than expected driver resignations. If, for example, the working conditions proved intolerable, it would rather weaken the arguments for competition.

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WorldbyStorm - September 11, 2019

Very true. I was talking to a DB driver a while back who was saying the private crew were having trouble attracting drivers in the first place.

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2. EWI - September 11, 2019

And as RBB notes, this is a service for which the operator is paid £125m over five years.

Perhaps because the real purpose may be guessed as being to establish both a rationale and an established private player to privatise Dublin Bus.

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3. irishelectionliterature - September 11, 2019

I use one of the new Go-Ahead routes , the 175 to get to Tallaght. One of their biggest problems is that their Real Time (which uses the TFI Journey planner App) is crap. The bus stop is a minute away from my house. I see that the bus is due in 5 minutes and it doesn’t turn up. So I’ve either missed it or it is late.
The Dublin Bus Real Time app is far superior. It’s a simple thing that should be a basic for the likes of myself that travels by bus.

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4. tafkaGW - September 13, 2019

You heathen unbelievers in the holy market deserve to rot in stateist hell for all eternity!

As anyone who had bothered the study the holy scripture of von Mises and Hayek would know, the market operates on a wholly unknowable and ineffable epistemological plane, discovering truths and utility that would otherwise be inaccessible to a grateful humankind.

What seems to you like the inefficiency of privatised transport implies nothing about the essence of the market; it is simply a lack of vision on your part. With sufficient meditation and self-denial, the inner essence of the Go-Ahead bus system would become intuitively apparent to you.

Use that time at the bus stop for spiritual exercises. Or do an MBA while waiting in the queue.

There *is* an app that works, it’s just that you are currently unworthy to download it.

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WorldbyStorm - September 13, 2019

That’s scarily like some right libertarian stuff I’ve read over the years. We had a guy who came on here who was very much taken with Hayek and Mises and IIRC after a few years of his own blog he emigrated with a line something like the Irish weren’t worthy of his thought. I actually quite liked him and I hope he did okay, but it was an interesting insight into the way that sort of thinking can impact on a person.

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