Mr. Tim Gaston:

When we tender competitions currently, we require bidders to provide us with a range of different quality criteria as well as their price. Clearly, the price is a significant part of the overall award. We ask them how they are going to set themselves up to maintain the vehicles, how they are going to handle customer complaints, how they are going to handle lost property, how they are going to make sure they adhere to the timetable and what sorts of backup systems they will have for their operational areas. Those are assessed as well as the price element.

During the term of the contract, we carry out mystery shopping and we use our own information that we receive from the ticketing equipment and from the automatic vehicle location equipment to hold operators to the standard that they said they would achieve. If they achieve that standard and they beat it, they can have an additional reward. If they do not achieve that standard, they face a deduction. Those awards and deductions are exactly the same on the State-subsidised operators as they would be on the tendered services.