Grant: Translink Need to Give Passengers a Guarantee

Ms Grant has called on Translink to give a guarantee that in future every passenger who has a valid ticket is provided with the service they paid for. This call is being made following a serious incident on the 20^{th of} June when 30 passengers who have bought tickets to travel on the last bus from Belfast to Newry were left stranded because the bus was full. One person had bought his ticket twenty minutes earlier. Ms Grant said this was an intolerable situation, and no help or alternative arrangements were made available to passengers who had bought their tickets in good faith.

Ms Grant said this was a very frightening situation for those passengers who could not travel, and the only solution offered to them was to club together and get taxis, this was an outrageous suggestion as most of the passengers were strangers. Translink staff told them they had no other alternative transport and asked them to leave the station. Some people had to book hotel rooms, others could not afford to pay for overnight accommodation, and some were left terrified and desperate to know how they would get home.

 Ms Grant said Translink would have known that the bus capacity had been reached, so why did they continue to sell tickets to 30 more passengers, having done so I believe that the company had the responsibility of delivering those passengers to their destinations, and meet the costs incurred. The Workers Party has been calling for more public transport to reduce our carbon footprint, this type of behaviour from Translink does not inspire confidence in the travelling public that they will receive the services they paid for. The Minister should be seeking an explanation from Translink on how this situation was allowed to happen and ensure that those passengers are compensated for the ordeal they suffered being stranded late at night forty miles from their destination. Translink has a responsibility not to oversell tickets for a service they can not provide. Many of those stranded were young women and girls who are unsafe at the best of times in our society due to violence both verbal and physical.

End