Multibillion-dollar secret bus deals take us for a ride

The revelation that, in its dying days, the outgoing NSW government had entered secret contracts for $5 billion on privatised bus services is disturbing at a number of levels.

The effect of the deals is profound: the contracts are for unusually large sums; the bus services affect most of metropolitan Sydney; the effect is long-term – the contracts will run for at least eight years. And because these are commercial arrangements, there can be no escape from the contracts without significant cost.

Privatisation of public transport was a live issue in the NSW election.Credit: Steven Siewert

But it is not just the money, and it is not just the fact that the contracts will entrench a questionable and contentious privatisation policy – the real problem here is what it says about those who govern us. This kind of conduct reflects the woeful way in which we are governed and the high-handed disdain that our politicians have for us – the electorate. This was a decision made in contempt of the fundamental right we have as voters to choose our government by reference to competing policies.

Look at the known facts. The issue of the privatisation of bus services was controversial. The Coalition and Labor had conflicting policies; the Greens position was consistent with Labor. The contending positions were well canvassed in the hearings conducted in the Legislative Council, culminating in a report delivered in September 2022, recommending that the privatisation be curtailed and reviewed. At that time, the transport policy was recognised as a key issue in the upcoming election. In fact, it was a primary policy issue.

This makes it hard to understand why these contracts, confirming and even extending privatisation, should be entered into in February and March 2023 – all within six months of the Legislative Council report. It is even harder to unpick the mentality of a stale government entering these agreements so close to an election where the very policy was going to be ventilated and, in an apparent rush, to enter the contracts just before the commencement of the caretaker period.

The contracts were kept secret so that the voters were denied the opportunity to consider them and take them into account when voting (and although there is a sound commercial reason to keep contractual negotiations secret while in progress, there was no basis for any secrecy once the contracts were executed).

The bus deals were inked about two weeks before the NSW parliament entered caretaker mode on March 3, before the state election three weeks later.Credit: Louie Douvis

This should not have happened, and if we were properly governed would not have happened. Think about it: the Coalition was surely aware it was likely to lose power (if they didn’t, its members can’t be very good at their job) and surely decent-minded politicians would believe that, in those circumstances, they should stop what they are doing, listen to the electorate, and obey its wishes. Apparently not.

So why have we been inflicted with these contracts? It is hard to say. While Transport for NSW said the deals recently signed were simply re-tendered when the previous terms ended, many questions remain. It might be easier to understand if some politician or bureaucrat would come forward to tell us, but I suspect they won’t. We are, thus, entitled to a little speculation.

Maybe the decision reflects some deeply ingrained aspect of a neo-Thatcherite commitment to privatisation – at least that is a recognisable ideological basis, even if the ideology is one with which many do not agree. Maybe it was simply an outgoing act of political bastardry, deliberately foiling the incoming government from implementing one of its policies – if that is the case, the size and terms of these contracts will prevent meaningful reform in this sector for nearly a decade. Maybe someone did it as a last gasp exercise of power. Whatever, it seems unlikely that those responsible could have thought that entering these contracts was the right thing to do.

It is all well and good to identify the problem, you say – but what about a solution? It was suggested to me that one means might be to extend the caretaker period, but that will not work: caretaker periods are deliberately kept short to maintain proper government and, in any event, could easily be subverted by unscrupulous decision-makers simply shifting the time at which they make their decisions. No – there is only one solution: the only way to improve this is by getting better candidates into parliament. This is not easy, but it should remain our target.

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