Gov't challenges NTCS over $2 billion award

Barbara Gayle, Staff Reporter

The Government is challenging an order by the Court of Appeal to pay out just over $2 billion to the National Transport Cooperative Society (NTCS).

This morning, the Government represented by former solicitor general Douglas Leys appeared in court seeking leave to go to the Privy Council to challenge the award.

However, the matter could not be heard as the Government also served additional documents on the Ezroy Millwood-led NTCS this morning.

The Appeals Court as well as Millwood’s attorney Lord Anthony Gifford and Patrick Bailey, need more time to review the documents.

So the parties are to return to court on Thursday, when the Government will outline why it wants leave to overturn the ruling of the Appeals Court to pay over $2 billion in damages to the NTCS.

The decade old case resulted from the decision of the Government to end the subfranchise agreement between the NTCS and the state-owned Jamaica Urban Transit Company (JUTC).

The NTCS had sued the Government to recover losses.

After several court battles, the London-based Privy Council upheld the arguments of the NTCS and ruled that the Government should pay damages.

However in court documents, the Government said there was a problem in the way the Court of Appeal calculated the award.

It said the award should not have been calculated from 2004 but instead from 2009 when the Privy Council made the ruling.

It also said the award should have been calculated on the basis of competition in the sector and not on the basis of a single transport operator for the corporate area.

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