Arriva's Cost Cutting

[mr t]

 Arriva's Cost Cutting
Well well well, I was talking to someone within Arriva fairly high up and involved, and apparently every depot in Merseyside/North West has been tasked over 12 months since last April to reduce their PVR by 5 vehicles.
This is in the face of lowering budgets from up above and rising wages/lowering local authority returns/more commercial services having to be operated fully with no financial support and trying to achieve that 15 year vehicle life.
Losing 5 vehicles also removes the relevant need for drivers and maintenance costs which obviously dont get replaced.
If you think we have 10 depots across Merseyside/Manchester/Cheshire that is 50 buses which can then be scrapped at 15 years old and not be replaced this year.
The service reductions have already been well instigated in each depot , and from what i can recollect by the time the service changes hit in July and September, every depot will actually have achieved the said target.
So this is the real reason why so many services have actually been reduced or withdrawn across the North West over the last year.