Seeing red at the waste of €50 million at Irish Rail

This week's column in The Kerryman newspaper.

Michael Commane

Imagine if we were told that train drivers at Irish Rail were responsible for losing €50 million of the company’s funds? We would rightly be appalled.

Locomotive drivers and their unions would be pilloried. Can you visualise newspaper headlines, especially on the front pages of tabloids?

Over the last few weeks we have been drip fed another story of financial ineptitude at state owned organisations. This time it centres around the installation of a new signalling system, better said, it involves new software technology for the operation of a new modern signalling system. Signalling is at the heartbeat of a railway; modern technology allows trains to travel at speed, running within minutes of each other. 

The railway in Ireland was upgraded from the old mechanical semaphore system to electrical signalling in the 1970s and ’80s. It is called Central Traffic Control, known in railway jargon as CTC. 

Management at the National Transport Authority (NTA), in conjunction with their colleagues at Irish Rail employed Spanish company Indra to develop an updated version of CTC, which they call Transport 

Management System, or in shorthand TMS.

From a personal perspective I am of the opinion our media has let us down in explaining in detail, in a language understandable to the lay person what actually the situation is.

A lay person’s question: would it not have been possible to have tweaked the older CTC system to make it fit for purpose for our modern railway?

It now seems Irish Rail and the NTA are not happy with the work done by Indra and the general consensus is that €50 million has been wasted on the project. It also means that there will be significant delays in bringing the railway into the modern era.

Why has this happened? With any job I have ever undertaken I have kept an eye on what was being done, and if I did not have the expertise I’d call in an expert to audit the development.

Surely it was not overnight that Irish Rail and the NTA realised that their €50 million had been lost. 

Was management not keeping a close eye on works as the project was being developed? It sounds absurd that they suddenly realised that €50 million was down the drain.

And here’s where I ask; why were journalists not keeping an eye on the project and asking all the right questions. Isn’t that why we cherish democracy; it allows  our journalists to search and probe into what’s happening in our society.

If it works out as bad as it is looking right now, will there be anyone held to account for such a financial disaster? I doubt it.

We pay managers big money so that they will do good jobs. What happens when they fail; why should they not be held to account?

Irish Rail is down €50 million. Why, who caused this to happen?  

In this specific case I’ve been disappointed in the media coverage of how it has all gone so wrong, indeed, so wrong to the value of €50 million. Where has the media been on this story?

In the meantime, I’m still confused how the four entities NTA, TFI, CIÉ, and TII work together for the betterment and the streamlining of Irish transport.