Opposition wants Arriva-government agreement published

Nationalist MP Toni Bezzina has urged the government to publish in full the agreement reached with former public transport service provider Arriva as a state-owned company has temporarily taken over the service.

Transport Minister Joe Mizzi has already declared that he found "no problem" in publishing the agreement. It is yet to be seen whether this will be published in parliament.

"The PN understands the difficulties which had engulfed the public transport service under Arriva's management. But one cannot also ignore the fact that the reform led to the introduction of a number of services and facilities," Bezzina said.

The MP said the reform had introduced a modern fleet, "buses which did not pollute and which were accessible to persons with disability, the elderly and mothers with pushchairs."

Bezzina said the new buses were equipped with air conditioning service while bus fares were cheaper for the elderly, students and frequent users.

On 1 January 2014, the Malta Public Transport Services Ltd took over the public transport, together with a debt of around €10 million. According to Transport Malta chief James Piscopo, in reality there was nothing which bound Arriva to Malta, except for a €2 million bond. Considering that by December 2012, Arriva had already suffered €22 million operational loss, Arriva's future in Mata had already been bleak.

Bezzina said the public now expected the public transport service to be better than last year's.

"The government must now give exemplary leadership which should be followed by the new operator," he said.

He added that the PN was expecting the choice of the new operator to be fully transparent while the workers' future guaranteed.