A court case last week saw two taxi drivers in Southampton fined for picking up passengers. What’s wrong with that, I hear you ask. Well, the problem was that their taxi licence only allows them to operate when their customers have pre-booked and doesn’t allow them to pick up passengers from taxi ranks or the street.
A little harsh, you might think but in the UK there is a two-tier system; one licence applies to the hackney carriage, or taxi drivers, that are able to pick up passengers via taxi ranks and streets but the other licence is for private hire vehicles only and their customers must book in advance, otherwise these drivers are not insured correctly. There are supporters of the two-tier system, but there are also many that would like to see the system scrapped in favour of just one licence that covers both.
Many taxi drivers would like to see just one licence; they have more flexibility, they can earn more, there’s less animosity between private hire and hackney carriage drivers, it makes the drivers more accountable (possibly), and we are then following the taxi system in a majority of other countries. On the other side of the coin, how many times have we left something behind in a taxi and tried to get it back? With a pre-booked taxi you are much more likely to see that item again; with a hackney carriage taxi it’s more than likely you will never see that item again. And then there’s the aspect of reliability and finding a taxi on the street or at a rank sometimes isn’t easy, particularly in rush hour. At least with a pre-booked taxi, you know it’s definitely going to be there for you. If all taxis became one tier and were able to pick up people at taxi ranks, where would be put all the taxi ranks in the cities? There just isn’t the space. And then there’s the question of insurance; private hire taxis come under a different insurance structure to that of hackney carriage taxis.
There are arguments for and against the two-tier system but if we did scrap this and revert to a one-tier system, it would be very tough for the hundreds of private hire taxi companies, many of which are small businesses. Private hire and hackney carriage taxis can and do work effectively, there is a place for both and there should be mutual respect for both by all drivers.