This is even better than a cup of coffee. I get so pissed off after reading I can’t sleep even until 0130hrs in the morning.
Will try to contain costs
By Li Xueying, Political Correspondent
WITH 2009 shaping up to be a ‘difficult year’, the government will try to moderate public transport costs next year, promised Transport Minister Raymond Lim on Sunday.
The Public Transport Council (PTC) will continue to take economic conditions into account in its annual assessment of bus and train fares, due in the second half of next year, he added.
But Mr Lim also tempered hopes that current falling oil prices will translate into a similar drop in fares, saying that there is no direct correlation between the two. If there is, public transport fares would have shot up 40 percent between last year and earlier this year on the back of a spike in oil prices over the period, but did not, he said.
Mr Lim was speaking at a dialogue with some 300 MacPherson residents on Sunday. He was accompanied by Member of Parliament for MacPherson Matthias Yao.
In the morning, he toured the constituency, distributing food rations, chatting with residents and participating in a ceremony to lock in a time capsule containing items such as community photos.
This was followed by an hour-long dialogue where the minister fielded six questions. While a few residents touched on matters such as cycling paths and foreign workers, it was clear that concerns about the cost of living amid a recession were on the top of most minds.
Mr Gillian Teo, 54, a business development manager, started the ball rolling by expressing the hope that there will not be any public transport fare increase next year, as retrenchments mount.
In his response, Mr Lim said: ‘I can understand his concern. It’s going to be a difficult year next year, so we’ll try our best if possible to moderate the costs.
‘How do we do it?’
The PTC, which regulates public transport fares, will have to ‘sit down’ and weigh various factors: the impact on commuters, on transport operators and the economic conditions.
‘So it will factor all this in,’ he said.
The last round of fare adjustments was in September, when the PTC approved an overall net hike of 0.7 percent in bus and train fares.
But the minister also dispelled the hope expressed in a popular question that he said many have put to him: With oil prices now plummeting, why not fares too?
‘That’s a fair question,’ he said. ‘The answer is that public transport fares are not directly linked to oil prices.’
Instead, they are tied to what Mr Lim called national factors: the level of inflation and average wage increases.
Refuting the idea that fares are directly linked to oil prices, he pointed out that ‘from 2007 to this year… oil prices went up 40 percent, but fares went up just 0.7 percent’.
Another resident asked if commuters should be reimbursed the higher transport fares that they paid when oil prices were high, and if the transport companies were making ‘a lot of profits’.
Mr Lim urged his audience to look at the ‘big picture’. He said: ‘We don’t want the companies to be making excessive profits, but that’s different from saying that they cannot make profits at all.’
Like I have said before, the current leadership lea-duhship inspires no confidence in the people. This is yet another classical example of them being so detached from the people in their ivory towers that they either couldn’t feel what the common people is going through, or they wouldn’t give a fxxk at all because they think we are all idiots.
First of all, let’s put an end to this bullshit, Raymond Lemon Lim. Just how much profits should the transport operators make before even you would consider it excessive? Just like the freaking Town Council sinking sink hole funds, please put a cap on it. Or do we need to wait for some smart clerk to come around and siphon off all that money before you guys with your helicopter vision suddenly discovered a need to do something about it?
Frankly, the transport operators repeatedly justify their need to raise fares annually by citing higher operating – especially fuel – costs, and just what arcane formula is being used here to determine the annual increase before the PTC rubber stamps its approval?
It is a clear sign that Lemon is truly out of touch with the economy and farting through his mouth when he even mentioned these: the level of inflation and average wage increases. The fact is, a lot of that inflation is artificial! GST, ERP remember? Not to mention the likes of sugar prices, rice prices going up to drive up the costs of your regular meals, and even your cup of kopitiam coffee!
Anyway, the economy will be shrinking and consumer confidence will plummet as the magnitude of the current recession sinks in. While I don’t expect a deflation, that will still mean inflation returning to saner levels, not to mention negligible or zero wage increases or else companies will need to start retrenching staff. In fact, with our currency devaluing and factoring in inflation, we have technically a negative wage growth! So where is your justification not to reduce fares? It brings me back to ask again, what is the arcane formula used to justify the amount of fare raises since Lemon actually brought up that fuel costs are up 40% but fares are only up 0.7%? Don’t forget, we had record inflation over the past few quarters too!
Is Lemon Lim suggesting that wage increment was the only ‘saving grace’ that kept the fare increment to 0.7% then? Thanks for implicitly admitting that our wage increments suck (other than that of the mini$ter$). That goes to say… we have been bearing a greater burden with almost the same amount of money all the while!
On top of that, if my kneecap or shoulders can think, even they would have figured out that the following two components will be the biggest part of the transport operators’ operating costs – fuel and wages. However, we can see with our own eyes that even when fuel prices was at record levels, the transport operators were still making profits! How did that happen is anybody’s guess, but it suggests that the operators maintain a comfortable amount of ‘strategic fuel reserves’ to protect them for such price jitters. As for wages, didn’t they bring in drivers from China recently?
Lemon Lim is probably trying to act smart by not committing to anything. In fact, he might be just setting the stage to show that the Tali-PAP actually cared for common Singaporeans (they do?) when the PTC reduced fares next September just when the economic conditions will either get worse than it already is, or when it can’t be even worse. But to say that the ‘fare hike is not linked to oil price’ part is just plain lame and dumb. Either way, he showed that he is either not cut to take impromptu questions from the public at all, or he treats us all as idiots.
But if it’s the former, in the future he should always just bring the permanent secretary or whatever along and have that poor sod take the bullet instead.
And by the way, Lemon Lim can go ahead raise GST to 10% if all rides on bus and MRT is free. After all, that sounds like the underlying tone in his reply.
Comics:
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