And today we also asked the Minister of Transportation about this. He explained that they've had an open dialogue with the bus operators and he has explained to them that fuel prices have to be a decision made by the Cabinet. So he's asking them for a bit of patience and in the meantime, they're working out a tiered approach to the increased bus fares.
Hon. Rodwell Ferguson, Minister of Transport
"Unfortunately, the prime minister was out of the country for one week, so there was no cabinet for two weeks and so all I ask them for patience that I as the minister responsible for transportation cannot arbitrarily say okay we are going to raise the price without cabinet consent. So they continue with the C.E.O. for about 4 hours and I guess they never came into terms and so when I came in Monday morning I had several meetings, but I took time out to meet with them and we had a discussion back and forth again and I explain and the C.E.O., over the weekend, drafted several tables so we can go forward and after we showed them the tables they agreed that yes, we have to just maybe wait until Cabinet is ready for us but we are telling them - we've put the papers together and taken them to Cabinet and see what is Cabinet's position on the raise on the price of fuel. What we are saying then is if the price of fuel continues to fluctuates and it goes back down, then we do a tiered approach, so if it's at fourteen dollars we will say okay, the increase is that (amount), if it goes back to twelve dollars, we go back to twelve dollars because of the price went down, so we'll come up with the best scenario. I think they are very happy and they went back and they said okay, let's wait until Cabinet on Monday of next week."
Reporter
"So then there will likely be a bus fare increase if the price of fuel continues rising. Now, is it a case where the government will look at subsidizing, because at the end of the day thats going to fall on the consumers. We are still in a pandemic, people are very affected and the people themselves, the commuters may not accept any bus fare increase."
Hon. Rodwell Ferguson, Minister of Transport
"That may be another scenario if that case arises. If you look on the thread of facebook, the commuters are saying that we want better busses on the highway and we don't mind pay the price if we get better transportation service across this country. So I believe that the commuter might erupt, because they would say you are increasing the price for me and then the busses are still old and inadequate. So we hope we could balance the act as we go along and figure out how quick we can resolve it."
