Crunch talks are being held in a bid to avert a blockade by 120 minicab drivers which could bring Dagenham to a standstill.Who’d notice, if they did it at rush hour, school-run time or Saturday?
But what’s their beef, anyway?
The drivers are planning to park their cars to stop traffic on four main roads unless Barking and Dagenham’s traffic department removes yellow lines outside their offices and gives them parking bays.Wha..?
They say they have been parking on the yellow lines – in breach of the Highway Code – to pick up passengers without receiving fines for years, but are now being given CCTV parking tickets.About bloody time too!
Mark Williams, 40, said: “There are 120 drivers. They are fuming and spitting blood.Well, no. Actually, you don’t. You are minicabs, and can only be pre-booked. They are hackney cab and can be hailed on the street.
“We pay so much money each year. Black cabs can drive in bus lanes, but we can’t.
There is one rule for them and one rule for us. We all do the same job.”
You’re patently not the same, and so have different regulations and allowances.
I bet you aren’t prepared to pay for that bay, either…
“We’re not asking for the world – we’re just asking for our rights.”It’s your right to be allowed to ignore yellow lines, or have a designated parking bay?
I bet you aren’t prepared to pay for that bay, either…
The blockade has been put on hold pending the outcome of a meeting with Barking and Dagenham Council and Jon Cruddas, MP for Dagenham and Rainham, on October 21.That’ll be interesting….
7 comments:
There may be more to this than meets the eye. You are permitted to stop on double yellow lines to pick up or drop off passengers, and it may be that CCTV parking enforcement is wrongly picking up vehicles legitimately doing this. After all, there have been cases when people have been sent penalties from CCTV for having been stopped in a traffic queue!
There will be great employment opportunities now for disabled mini cab drivers, I'm sure.
Splendid. We are about to have a philosophical discussion on the definition of taxi-rank and pre-booking.
My money is on the black cab drivers winning it, especially with the Olympics coming up. It's a strong team and it has about 150 years of experience. The Minicabbers have only been a formal team for under a decade.
Let's not forget that the Black Cabbers whipped Michael Portillo's backside in the 1980s and are about the only electoral demographic to cause the Iron Lady to hang a u-ey.
I had that Boris Johnson in the back of the cab once. But then, so did everyone.
Taxi drivers are always looking for special privileges are they not?
They particularly like taxi licences to be tightly limited in number, so that there's not too much competition (preferable, none at all, just them and their mates) and they can keep the prices up.
It's time they were just dropped into the competitive shark-tank that the rest of us have to swim in, imho.
But I suppose they are too well-connected in most local councils for that to happen.
They particularly like taxi licences to be tightly limited in number
Black cab numbers are not limited. However, the standards to gain one and keep a vehicle on the roads are very high.
Minicabs were not licenced at all in London until 2003 when they accepted a regulatory framework to make sure that every idiot with a death-trap couldn't pay some insurance (or just take a chance) and start picking up the unwary.
This naturally provided a barrier to entry but was broadly welcomed by the public who wanted to get home in one piece. The private hire firms accepted the trade-off; the could only take on certain cars and drivers, but they wouldn't face unlimited competition.
"There may be more to this than meets the eye. You are permitted to stop on double yellow lines to pick up or drop off passengers..."
It's possible, but even the cab drivers seem to be admitting they are - legally - in the wrong. Unless the newspapers report is incorrect, which really wouldn't be unusual for the .B&D Post'...
"There will be great employment opportunities now for disabled mini cab drivers, I'm sure."
I'm not sure even the blue badge gives you that dispensation, does it?
"My money is on the black cab drivers winning it, especially with the Olympics coming up."
Heh! Me too :)
"But I suppose they are too well-connected in most local councils for that to happen."
Probably not this one...
"I'm not sure even the blue badge gives you that dispensation, does it?"
I don't know what the law is exactly, not having one of the magical blue badges - but you can hardly see double yellows around here because of the 'disabled' drivers parked all over them.
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