Decision time over Dial a Ride service (From Swindon Advertiser)
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Decision time over Dial a Ride service
9:50am Wednesday 19th May 2010 in News By Charley Morgan
THE FUTURE of the Dial a Ride service is set to be discussed by Swindon Council tomorrow.
The council is expected to announce that as its funding of the service has been found to be in breach of European Union anti-competition laws, the service must be put out to tender.
Dial a Ride provides free door-to-door transport for the elderly and disabled so they can get to school, to doctor’s appointments, shopping or to clubs.
Conservative-led Swindon Council threatened to cut £50,000 from Dial a Ride’s £331,000 a year funding at the end of last year, but backed down in the face of fierce opposition from other councillors and members of the public.
The Labour group on the council believes that putting the Dial a Ride contract out to tender will enable private companies to bid for it, which they say will mean customers having to pay to use the service.
Swindon Labour group leader, Coun Derique Montaut, said the proposals would put Dial a Ride out of existence and called for people to oppose them.
“The Conservative administration’s plans would get this incredibly important decision for the most vulnerable in our town wrong,” he said.
He claimed that no other Dial a Ride service in the country had had its funding withdrawn as a result of European Union laws, and questioned why the council was pursuing this course of action.
A Swindon Council spokesman said: “During 2009, a review of the Dial a Ride service was undertaken and it was established that the current arrangement of providing a grant to Swindon Dial a Ride does not conform to current European law.
“In order to maintain continuity of service to the public, an interim agreement has been put in place with Swindon Dial a Ride until the services are formally tendered to the open market.
“The council is currently discussing how best to procure a Dial a Ride service for members of the public who are unable to use conventional public transport and we expect to reach a way forward on this shortly.”
The service will be discussed at a meeting of Swindon Council’s procurement advisory group tomorrow.
Comments(11)
politicrat
says...
10:36am Wed 19 May 10
Captain Sensible wrote:and the fate of the councillor responsible for it?
Never mind when all these old people are housebound as a result of the cuts to dial a ride they can all take advantage of the free WIFI, simples! By the way anybody know what hapened to a missing £500k of taxpayers money?
Look what you are asking is beyond 99% of the swindon sheeple brains
Lets concentrate on the positive:-)
The future is bright, the future is blue LOL
fsb
says...
10:52am Wed 19 May 10
Customers DO PAY to use the service. Contrary to what many non-users seem to think, users have to pay either with cash or with tokens for every trip.
Unlike other elderly or disabled people who are able to use the regular bus services, and have unlimited free travel after 9.30 am, they don't get enough tokens to allow even one weekly trip every week of the year.
politicrat
says...
11:18am Wed 19 May 10
fsb wrote:how about cycling? seems to be the latest mode of transport in Town
"which they say will mean customers having to pay to use the service. " Customers DO PAY to use the service. Contrary to what many non-users seem to think, users have to pay either with cash or with tokens for every trip. Unlike other elderly or disabled people who are able to use the regular bus services, and have unlimited free travel after 9.30 am, they don't get enough tokens to allow even one weekly trip every week of the year.
Bobfm
says...
12:16pm Wed 19 May 10
reality_check
says...
12:41pm Wed 19 May 10
Jiver
says...
6:37pm Wed 19 May 10
Sadly I'm only a Swindon Sheeple, whatever that is.
Duh, I don't know.
Bobfm
says...
6:52pm Wed 19 May 10
reality_check
says...
12:58pm Thu 20 May 10
Jiver
says...
6:46pm Thu 20 May 10
reality_check wrote:Ha Ha!
'Call me Bob', playing to the gallery as you do doesn't merit a response I'm afraid.
Quality!
qualia
says...
9:40am Tue 25 May 10
Instead of just saying that they are going to cut the service, they have had to try to apply an inappropriate EU law to hide behind.
They are using Articles 107 and 93 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU).
These sections of the EU treaty were designed to protect member states from other member states providing state aid to companies in order to gain a competitive advantage.
As a side note, David Milliband had to write to the EU commission (N 677/2009) about the £300 billion state aid given to UK banks. The commission said that was OK!
Captain Sensible says...
10:25am Wed 19 May 10