Rail and Maritime Transport Union South Island organiser John Kerr yesterday took aim at "unelected bureaucrats ... sabotaging" the tourism attraction by not applying for the Tourism Recovery Fund’s strategic tourism assets protection programme, nor a continuation of the Government wage subsidy scheme as 50 jobs appeared condemned to redundancy on June 30.
"We think they’ve been very, very misleading — all this talk of mothballing; we don’t think it’s mothballing at all.
"We think the intent on the part of the board chair Kevin Winders has been to close the operation down," he said.
"We’re not accepting anything he’s saying in that regard. We think he’s bent on closing the thing down.
"The accusation is ‘sabotage by dereliction’ — we’re really questioning their sincerity, yeah."
Whale Watch Kaikoura learned last week it was getting $1.5million in rescue funding to stay afloat while New Zealand’s borders remained closed to international tourists.
And the bailout, from the Government’s strategic tourism assets protection programme, part of a $400million package for the tourism sector, would be a "knock in" for Dunedin Railways.
Now, he said some railway assets were being sold.
Mr Winders said yesterday he had not been contacted by Mr Kerr or the union directly, but he said he "clearly" rejected the claim — and with 85% of the company’s client base coming from the international market while the borders remained closed, an 18-month mothballing was as good an answer as the company could provide at present for the Taieri Gorge train.
"I know it’s a difficult answer that the union are getting from the company in respect of its team — and I can understand that it’s disappointing, that they are disappointed with the outcome, but it’s the best outcome we could provide for the train and the opportunity to restart the train in the future," Mr Winders said.
"Effectively, what we were able to do is to use the Government wage subsidy for the 12-week period to give them an extended notice period ... and effectively give them a softer blow.
"To then go and apply for a [further] wage subsidy without a sustainable business does not meet the criteria — so that is not something that we would pursue."
Further, he said a strategic tourism assets protection programme application had been made, but only insofar as exploring options for the company’s future.
Dunedin City Holdings Ltd general manager Jemma Adams would not specify the amount of funding applied for, but said it was in the "hundreds of thousands" of dollars.
Dunedin Mayor Aaron Hawkins said yesterday the council had asked Dunedin City Holdings Ltd to "explore a range of options for the future of both the business and the asset", which he expected to come to council for consideration "later this year".
Mr Winders said the company would assess "a restart through to various other options".
"From a full-blown railway against a commuter rail through to the train being removed and ceased and effectively it becomes a cycleway — there’s a fair gambit of options," he said.
"And that process will start on July 1."
