They convene a table to discuss increasing fares during peak hours and voluntary withdrawals

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The Ministry of Transportation of the Province will reconvene in the next few hours to the negotiation table in which, together with the union, companies, the Ministry of Labor and Ersep, a restructuring of the entire interurban system is being discussed. This is in response to the three-day strike that Aoita announced for next Monday, Thursday and Friday.

The restructuring that has been being debated for two months now contemplates a new increase in the fare during peak hours, the reduction of between 300 and 500 jobs via voluntary retirements or early retirements and improvements in the coordination of services to avoid unproductive kilometers.

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The difference between what the union asks for and what the companies, based in Fetap, offer, is not the only problem that the system has for its sustainability, understands Cristian Sansalone, director of provincial Transportation.

The union wants a floor of one million pesos per worker, to be equipped with UTA salaries. Companies already pay about 850 thousand, with 250 thousand in a non-remunerative amount. They offered to stretch a little further, to reach around 300 thousand pesos for that item. But the union wants the million and for it to go to the basics. There it got stuck and at this point the measure of force seems inevitable.

The mandatory conciliation alternatives go through the National Ministry of Labor, something that would no longer have a reason to exist after the definancing of the system outside of Amba.

In the restructuring proposed by the Province there is not just one, but a set of measures that aim to improve the economy of the system, through savings or better collection. “There is no measure to get the missing money, there are several issues at the same time, to balance kilometers and number of passengers,” said Sansalone.

One of the measures is another increase in the ticket, although with a differential characteristic. “Differential fares will be proposed by time, with a 10 percent increase in peak hours, but in off-peak hours (when the number of passengers decreases) there will be no increase, in order to discriminate and encourage the use of the system during peak hours.” unprofitable,” Sansalone anticipated.

At the same time, modifications are being considered in the modality with the permission for new stops to make ascents and descents in places where they were not allowed to improve the offer and avoid the duplication of unprofitable routes. For this, coordination will be sought between the companies, so that instead of competing for the same passenger, they cover a greater time slot and guarantee a service with greater frequency and predictability, explained the official who reports to the Secretary of Transportation, Marcelo Rodio.

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Cuts will also be authorized in services that have such a low passenger/kilometer rate that they are impossible to pay for without subsidies. “At some points we are going to work in synergy with some municipal urban companies, to prevent the interurban from making so many turns and we can work with transfers. In other cases, we are going to have to unfortunately allow services to be withdrawn,” the official admitted.

Alejandro Ugalde, spokesperson and legal representative of the Federation of Automotive Passenger Transport Companies (Fetap), said that if the rules established by the State on the service are not modified, there will be no companies that can provide it. “We depend on the will of the State: if it wants to cut hours, unproductive services, that brings a reduction in services, and then in labor, it is a chain that is going to occur. But we are operators, we depend on the rules and directives of the State and with those rules they have to close our numbers because otherwise we cannot continue providing the service,” he warned.

In this way, it is whitewashed that a staff cut of between 300 and 500 people is already being discussed with the opening of early retirements, retirements, suspension and staff rotation. There are 3,000 intercity drivers, if we add the inland urban drivers, also members of Aoita, there are 500 more. This is an estimated reduction in staff of between 7 to 15 percent.

Companies have already been announcing that they are studying the opening of crisis preventive processes. “The operating cost is 10.5 billion and we raised 7 thousand, how do we lower that without affecting labor costs,” business spokespersons justified.

The provincial government’s intention is to give two more weeks to the dialogue at the restructuring table – which has already had eight previous meetings – to implement the changes in mid-May.

The possibility of new provincial subsidies to avoid unemployment was ruled out. “The Province has already made the effort by tripling social programs, that is sustaining the demand. If we don’t bank, those passengers stop traveling. We tripled the Free Educational Ticket, which already has 256 thousand users and we made the financial decision to advance the payment of these programs, this month we already paid in full for April and the same will happen in May. What the Province already contributes is much more than what the Nation fails to receive, which is about 7 billion pesos in 10 months. It is going to go from 11 billion to 30 billion in the BEG alone, with the difference that we are not going to put them in the supply of cars, but in the demand,” defended Sansalone.

“What we propose is that tickets be paid for what they cost, the State pays for the tickets that it decided to give to users at 50%. If it does not assume the value of the tickets, at least the proportion should increase because the situation arises that these trips affect times in which we could have better income for a flat rate, such as peak work hours,” they stated from Fetap.

The strike announced by Aoita

The union said that this Friday, April 19, informational assemblies will be held in all companies in the morning. The service could suffer, something that already happened a few days ago.

Meanwhile, for Monday the 22nd they announced a total stoppage of activities from 0 and for 24 hours. The same force measure will be carried out on Thursday the 24th, although it will be longer and will last for 48 hours.

It will be during this last measure that the union will also hold a rally at the Bus Terminal in the city of Córdoba.

The companies anticipated that they will discount the days not worked.