Minister Austin “Powers” Gatt has announced that due to the horrible state of the roads in the Republic plans are on the line to privatise the Maltese road system. From the Times:
Roads Minister Austin Gatt said today with the current standard of the road network being unacceptable, the government intends moving to a system where a private contractor would be responsible for the roads. (…) A spokesman for the Roads Ministry explained when contacted that plans still under discussion provided for the roads network to be transferred to a contractor who would be responsible for the design, build, financing and operation of the roads. This did not mean privatisation of the roads, but the contractor would be responsible for building and maintaining the roads for a definite period. The purpose was to have high and uniform standards throughout the network. Further details would be announced in the coming weeks.
This blog has often gone on record expressing admiration of Gatt’s Thatcherite tactics and attitude but we must admit that this “PrivatisatioN” business (weired capitalisation is intended) caught us on the wrong foot. What kind of improvement are they expecting from this kind of privatisation I ask? To begin with the choice of words of the spokesman quoted above says it all… this is not really a privatisation of the roads but a privatisation of the responsibility of designing, financing and operating the roads.
Wunderbar. So first and foremost we have an implicit admission of the government’s incapability to retain responsibility for the road system in an island that is some 29 by 12 km large. This is quickly followed by a “solution” that smells of the privatisation of the British Railroad System. Trains ran later than ever but now the blame fell squarely on the operators and not in the government.
Finally some explaining will need to be done with regards to the fact that the new “international” contractor will have to think about the “financing” of the road system. Apart from managing applications for EU transport funds one cannot envisage any other form of “financing” than either channelling road taxes directly into a private company’s coffers or adding the Maltese equivalent of toll booths on our pseudo-highways.
Although he is a repeat offender in that he rarely provides a concrete alternate solution to a problem, Inhobbkom Joseph is right to be asking questions of this plan that has been pulled out of the conjuror’s hat by that most plausible of PN magician’s Austin “Ironman” Gatt.
The recent multiplication of traffic cameras along the roads of Malta did not cheer many motorists. Nor did the tax on imported cars do anything to improve their humour. All we need is a Toll Booth system and a contractor who would be doing just what the government should have been doing all this time… Plus ça change!
Flimkien kollox possibli… (all complaints to be directed to private contractors)
