Following a meeting with the NTA (National Transport Authority) this morning on the Prime Time Investigates programme on disturbing practices in the taxi industry, Public Transport Minister, Alan Kelly announced he will be conducting a full-scale review of the industry. A Review of the Taxi Industry as agreed under the programme for Government will be designed to ensure better safety for consumers and regulation for drivers.
“A review of all matters relating to the taxi industry is already underway for a number of weeks. The scope of the review is being written currently and will be published within the next three to four weeks,”
“The idea behind the review is to clean up the appalling practices that take place in some areas of the taxi industry,”
“The drive to clean up these bad practices is coming from taxi-drivers themselves. The vast majority of drivers are legitimate operators but their businesses are suffering because they are competing with people not operating within the regulations. I suspect that the majority of taxi drivers were not surprised by the revelations on the taxi industry last night,”
“Last night’s Prime Time Investigates report demonstrates clearly that it is too easy to operate outside the current industry regulations. With not too much difficulty, it is possible to present yourself to the public as a legitimate taxi driver when you may be operating outside the laws and regulations,”
“The taxi industry has not been politically prioritised and both consumers and legitimate drivers have suffered as a result,”
“While the review will be all encompassing, it will specifically prioritise a number of key areas:
1. The role of the Gardai in terms of taxi regulation. Gardaí must play a leading role in taxi industry enforcement and not leave it to the nine enforcement officers in the regulators office. Currently Gardai do not have full powers to penalise taxi-drivers for lack of adherence to regulations and we will examine this under the review.
2. The system of monitoring and regulation of licenses is not stringent enough and criminals with serious convictions are being allowed to operate legitimately. Similarly, there is no obligation on multiple licence holders to inform the regulator of who is driving their taxi. They are only obliged to inform them if asked. While many multiple licence holders are compliant, it leaves the system open to abuse that may go undetected – the NTA are putting in place mechanisms to deal with this. There will also be an update of security features contained within drivers IDs and licences to enhance compliance.
3. Is the problem regulation or enforcement? The review will examine are the current regulations good enough if enforced properly or is new legislation required? Most of those exposed in the Prime Time programme were operating outside the current regulations but went undetected. The review will explore whether quantitative or qualitative regulation changes will be needed to ensure maximum consumer benefit to both consumers and drivers.
4. Currently to have a SPSV licence, you only have to present a tax clearance certificate once every five years. This leaves the industry open to social welfare exploitation, especially for drivers who are renting cars from multiple operators.
5. Knowledge standards and geographical knowledge of drivers must be of the highest standards .If you do not have this knowledge you simply should not be a service provider in the Taxi industry. Law changes may be required for retrospective geography changes.
6. The regulations surrounding vehicle standards are not being enforced fully. They should be incorporated as a central plank in the enforcement strategy and unsafe cars must be found and taken off the road. This Government takes very seriously the standards operating within the NCT sector and will be seeking to severely tighten up on the standards being operated by the NCT companies. We will be discussing the matter with the RSA at the earliest opportunity.
7. Examining the transfer of licences. Every taxi plate/vehicle licence is the property of the Minister for Transport and while the trade in these allows flexibility for drivers and consumers, there may need to be a re-balancing of this flexibility in the interests of the road safety and also prevention of fraudulent and criminal behaviour.
8. Working hours will also have to be looked at. While noting that it is a difficult area to police, the current regulations would not appear to be working effectively as a deterrent to working dangerous hours while driving around the public. We could explore different types of licences, such as day or night, or geographical area licences to ensure adherence to the highest standards of safety and customer service.
“This Government will be prioritising the regulation of the taxi-industry. Minister Varadkar and I will be ensuring that the review of the industry provides the necessary clean-up to allow consumers have confidence in our taxi system while legitimate drivers can make a decent living by operating within the necessary rules and regulations that are in place. The industry review will allow for input from all sides of the industry, drivers, consumers and regulators,”