Fears over bus merger

Published 14 Jan 2012 09:30

BARRHEAD'S MSP is to hold a crisis meeting with union chiefs over the claimed threat to jobs and local services posed by the controversial McGill's-Arriva bus takeover.

Together with Paisley and Renfrewshire North MSP Jim Sheridan, Hugh Henry is calling for a full enquiry into last year's reputed £10million acquisition of bus firm Arriva's local operation by rival company McGill's.

The move comes as McGill's faces an Office of Fair Trading review, which could study whether its new trading position is viable in competition terms.

The takeover, set to be finalised in March, expands the combined fleet by 165 buses and adds nearly 400 employees to McGill's, now reckoned Scotland's third largest bus group.

It will now be a major organisation with more than 700 workers and around 300 buses.

Mr Henry fears that besides potential redundancies McGill's will be handed a local monopoly that will make for high fares and poor service.

And he blames the SNP government - previously in favour of bus regulation - for refusing to bring order and fairness, as he sees it, to local transport services.

"The McGill's - Arriva competition was healthy," he said, "and the merger means we now have no guarantee of safeguards."

However McGill's managing director Ralph Roberts has reportedly dismissed the MSPs' fears as "local hearsay and gossip", and has pledged "99 per cent" of services will be retained.

He has also said there will be no change to the start and finish times of the services.

However McGill's, with bases in Barrhead and Greenock, has yet to announce how it plans to achieve economies in an expanded operation that now includes both the former Arriva staff and all of its local bus routes.

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This article appeared in Barrhead News 12 Jan 12

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