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| Fare hike to spur efficient transport services, Nazri says |
| Written by Yong Min Wei | |||
| Wednesday, 24 June 2009 13:43 | |||
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He said the last time a review that saw an increase in the public transport fare was May 1, 2005, and that since then, plenty of changes in the business environment saw a surge in operational costs such as instalment payments, insurance, driver’s wagers, fuel, tyres and terminal charges. "Increase in operational costs without changes and streamlining the fare rates will cost operators to post losses," he told Dewan Rakyat during a question-and-answer session June 24 in a reply to Datuk Ismail Mohamed Said (Kuala Krau–BN). Ismail had asked the prime minister to state the rationale for government increases on the fare for all types of public transport in the current economic crisis. According to Nazri, the government had taken steps to assist the public transport operators by allowing them to impose surcharge and additional fares to ensure that the public transport services that were offered were always adequate as well as deter operators from reducing their operating trips. He said with the private sector involved in providing public transportation, the government must ensure that the fares were reasonable and took into consideration that the operators must be in a position to profit from their services. "We hope an increase in fare would motivate the operators to give efficient transport services. If their services are bad following an increase, then they have no excuse and we will take action against them," he added. Nazri also said independent consultants would be involved to review the fares and determine whether there was a need to increase while taking into consideration that the amount that profited by the operators and the lower income public that formed bulk of the users. Meanwhile, the Dewan Rakyat was also told that the main function of the SMART Tunnel was to tackle flooding in the Kuala Lumpur city centre and surrounding areas such as Dataran Merdeka, Masjid Jamek LRT Station in Kampung Baru, Jalan Tun Razak and Jalan Tuanku Abdul Rahman. Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Datuk Douglas Uggah Embas said the SMART Tunnel managed to divert water about 56 times since its operations to avoid flooding in certain areas following heavy rain in the catchment areas of the Klang and Ampang rivers. "For example, during the flooding on March 22, 2008, SMART managed to divert some 1.2 million litres of water resulting from the overflow of the Klang river," he said adding that some 700,000 litres were also diverted on March 3, 2009. Douglas was replying to Tan Sri Abdul Khalid Ibrahim (Bandar Tun Razak–PKR), who wanted the minister to state why the flood problem persisted despite spending some RM2 billion to build the SMART Tunnel to tackle floods in the Kuala Lumpur city centre.
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