Two sides to a Fence, but how many Fences

Just because something is proposed in an eloquent manner, does not mean that it is undoubtedly correct.

Those that comment here in the best English that they can, and live daily with the frustrations that this trade inflicts on them, may sometimes seem antagonistic and abusive but the site is here to allow people to get things off their chest in a way they never would be able to do in a face to face way.

When the patter merchants come and make their comments, in long scripts that a short story publisher would be proud of, are we to just take it as read that they are right and the rest are wrong because their comments are short, abrupt and grammatically incorrect. I have always been suspicious of someone who talks too much and have always preferred a short, to the point sentence. Anyone who rambles on in answer to a question is just trying to make the questioner lose sight of their original argument.

When the Taxi trade was small (and profitable to the taxi driver) no one came forward with eloquence and offers of help. Now the Taxi trade is huge and all the ‘non taxi’ experts are coming out of the shadows to ‘help’ us. Sellers of purpose built taxis whose lifeblood is De-limitation in order to create a bigger market place, peddlers of NVQ’s & Btec’s using the tagline “get it now whilst it’s still free”, Legal Eagles are popping up everywhere. All these and some that haven’t found a niche yet would exploit the taxi driver and because they speak nicely and dress well they succeed, They are just salesmen, everyone has double glazing now so let’s eat up the taxi trade.

Councils are easily taken in and will jump through hoops to buy the latest taxi law book or issue a few more licences to accentuate the fact that they are a wheelchair friendly authority, but it’s not about the disabled it’s about selling cars. The expertise of these new salesmen is to create illusions that they can sell to a Council. ‘The public will benefit hugely if all your taxi drivers are NVQ qualified’……”people are having to queue for a taxi home, your council needs more taxis” (more car sales)…..”There is a mountain of taxi legislation; drivers need help so as not to fall foul of the law”

There are so many people, if you just look, jumping on the taxi gravy train, all will profit from the taxi trade whilst we watch our income decline.

A fresh faced kid in front of a classroom full of taxi drivers cannot imagine a weekend driving a taxi let alone teach us about it. It’s a scam, a government funded scam to create a new industry and employ people because the call centres are full or have been moved to India, But…it’s a free scam and according to Go Skills it will always be free with no plans to ever make it compulsory. So why do some of them sell it with the line “Get it now before you have to pay £600 for it” it’s a sales pitch and it’s a pitch that would not be tolerated if they were selling you an endowment policy.

We are currently in the biggest recession, that most of the people in work today have ever seen, and yet there are councils up and down this country who are delimiting taxis. Everybody is struggling financially but councils would increase our workforce at a time when people are, understandably cutting back on taxi use. Why would they do this, why would they create a bigger workforce in dwindling market? It doesn’t take a degree in economics to see the folly in this. The Government has been putting pressure on councils to issue more licences, a form of massaging employment figures. Manufacturers of Purpose built taxis are under pressure to make sales and will actively support delimitation or total deregulation of taxis, more taxis more sales, taxi drivers are barely making enough to live let alone buy big expensive vans with windows.

Legal types are writing books on taxi law, finding loopholes in laws that the taxi trade has worked within for years. They interpret laws in different ways then proclaim themselves champion of the lowly taxi driver, who has been convinced of his apparent fall if he doesn’t have someone to interpret the law for him, the taxi driver believes wholeheartedly that he has been saved because of the short term advantage he has experienced but all the time the taxi driver is having his livelihood stripped away, the money that used to be in his bag is being slowly diverted away to those who are clever, those salesmen who will create a market where there was no market.

Our trade will never recover as long as there are people who would rape it in this way, we will be reduced to the status workers who put in the hours whilst everyone above us takes the money.

We can expect increasing numbers of Hackney Carriages & Private Hire, higher fees and new fees will be invented. 25 years ago, that’s a long time I know, my test fee was £60 there was a 100 Hacks now there are 200 Hacks and the test fee is £274 not to mention locality test fee, badge fee, CRB fee, change of vehicle fee, retest fee, new door decals fee, new plate if lost or damaged fee.

My takings are marginally bigger than they were in 1984.and that’s only the visible costs, the invisible costs are increasing numbers of taxis, increasing vehicle costs and insurance, tax, fuel etc. Private Hire haven’t got to that stage yet as they have enjoyed a period of growth over the last 20 years or so but now their numbers are swollen and soon they will feel it if they are not already feeling it.

The Taxi trade is The Taxi Driver! He or she is the one doing the job, picking up the passengers and giving good service 24/7/365. He or she is responsible for all fees, maintenance; rent etc. nobody will jump out of the woodwork to help once you are overstretched financially, physically & mentally. Drivers are going bust across the country in a trade that should and used to be a good earner.

There are plenty more to take your place. That’s what we have, the exploiters are creating a massive pool of drivers, if one or two fall by the wayside no matter! Market forces in action. Meanwhile those that exploit protect their income by virtue of this massive pool. The Councils, operators, legal eagles and those that would educate are all sitting pretty as we are used to generate their income, which is fine…..until it is overdone. Every industry has interdependent industries, each one providing an income for the other, and a reason for being but where is our kickback. With the exception of the operator who brings Private Hire their work and the Council who licence us to carry out our work what benefit do the rest bring us? They exist entirely to take what they can from us by any means possible.

For all the NVQ’s & CRB’s & Locality tests the taxi trade is fast becoming less professional. There are drivers who don’t know their way around, which should be our area of expertise, drivers are picking and choosing their work (Cherry picking), overcharging, flimping of street fares, flimping of PH fares none of which can be controlled by the small amount of enforcement available, there is no deterrent. One thing that the Berwick situation has highlighted is the fact that the powers of Council enforcement are ridiculously limited.

Protest are useless, in the long term, as the stories within this site illustrate. There are many stories of Taxi drivers protesting at this or that with only short term results. Councils will meet with your association reps, they will comfort you, listen to you, make noises which will give you a false sense of security but do absolutely nothing, they will make a small show of checking vehicles and badges for the newspapers but they will not solve your problem. Councils and their officers may even read this and protest loudly about what they have done for you but we are no better off.

Can any driver of 20 years or more in the trade honestly say that, for all the protests, letters, meetings and complaints aimed at a Councils taxi policies, anything has changed for the better. Do we ever win anything? And it goes on five or ten years from now there will be protests and letters and meetings all over the country about the same things and still we will just have to grin and bear it but by then it will be costing us more than ever.

Has anyone’s takings kept pace with inflation? does anyone make the minimum wage (soon to be £5.80 per hour) I mean after running costs, fees, loan interest, repairs, fuel, road tax & vehicle depreciation. I have picked cleaners up who make more than us, shelf stackers at Tesco make more than us.

You see, there are lots of Fences and many sides!

Lastly, we are and always have been our own worst enemy. I can guarantee that only a handful of drivers will even read this, unless I insert lots of pictures, and even of those that do some will get bored after a couple of paragraphs and click the back button to Facebook & Mafia Wars.

So, it seems we are easy meat for the profiteers.

Possibly Related Posts:

• Doing The Job of Taxi Enforcement!
• Comment of The Week Re: Sex Attacks
• Comment of The Week: Ireland

Read More at Technorati on: taxi trade

More Stories:

Tagged as: taxi trade