A chara, - An article in the March 3rd edition of your paper drew attention to the intention of the government to divide CIÉ and privatise elements of it.
The argument in favour of a public transport system in which national train and bus services are controlled by separate, private companies is that it will lessen the burden on the taxpayer, and render the system more efficient. However, this theory is unsound in both its psychology and in its politics.
Private companies are owned by people who want to make money. Public transport rarely even makes a profit. Their definitions of the concept of "efficient" are polar opposites.
A private company is efficient when it maximises its profits. A public transport company is efficient if it serves all the diverse needs of the public, without wasting money.
With such divergent goals it's inevitable that private control of public transport will result in, at best, a reduction of services and, at worst, deliberate negligence which jeopardises passenger safety.
Having lived until recently in the UK, I would strongly agree that the British policy of privatising public transport was a failure. Many of my friends were students who travelled regularly on the trains between Glasgow and their home towns. Incredible as it may seem, there was not a single occasion where someone completed their return journey without experiencing a major delay.
Sadly, the inefficiency did not stop there; as your article highlighted, negligence in rail up-keep (carried out by a private company) caused the deaths of passengers. The British public transport system used to be paid for by the taxpayer and owned by the taxpayer, and now it is paid for by the taxpayer and owned by shareholders unaccountable to the public.
If Mr Brennan has lost his faith in the viability of a state-run transport system, he should visit some of the Central European countries soon to join the European Union. In Prague, for example, the city is comprehensively covered by a network of buses, trams and metro, all under the administration of a state-run company. The three modes are covered by one ticket and all of them run on schedule.
How is it that we in Ireland, a country which is supposedly so much more developed - and which certainly has a stronger economy - than many of the EU candidate countries, cannot muster the same standard of public transport? And why does Mr Brennan insist on copying the only system which is in a worse shambles than Ireland's?
Most importantly, why are the Irish people not vocally castigating yet another attempt to try to sell us the proverbial "pig in a poke"?
Just what is modern Irish society's criteria of "efficiency"? How willing are we to fund public services? What are the alternatives offered by other countries' experiences? If the right choices are to be made, comprehensive public debate is imperative. - Is mise,
MAIRÉAD NÍ CHROININ,
Prague,
Czech Republic.