sʇuǝɯǝʌɐd pǝpɐǝɹɥʇ: Prime Time Investigates

Do you feel safe using an Irish taxi ? O.o

I'm a member of a minority of students who could barely afford to take public transport on a daily basis, and would use the no. 11 route (by foot) even in stormy situations. So, I'd always regarded taxis as a form of luxury, for the end of the month post payment treat, and of course luxury comes with comfort, safety, secureness.....right ?

To be honest, I had a pretty sleepless night last night, my mind racing after watching RTE Prime Time Investigates – entitled Dodgy Cabs Ltd.. Although I'm not a frequent taxi user, I was so, so enraged and disturbed by the findings plastered on the screen as reported by Paul Maguire.

I'll go easy on the shocking statistics -_-

One in seven licensed taxi drivers out on the roads today had had a criminal conviction, including violence and sexually-related offences. Wouldn't you love to be drunk going home from partying and getting into one of those taxis ?
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Bus driver by day, taxi driver by night. With barely enough time to nap, are these drivers putting passengers at risk ? As read on the Irish Examiner, "Prime Time Investigates also reported on one man who was driving 90 hours a week or more as a bus driver and as a taxi driver. The man was recorded working for 51 hours in three days." Taxi Regulator Kathleen Doyle commented "That particular situation is totally unacceptable and we wouldn’t support a situation where a driver endangers any member of the public. It is the driver’s responsibility to ensure their position as a self-employed taxi driver is safe." Apparently taxi drivers cannot drive for more than 11 hours a day on any three consecutive days but that the regulator “can’t monitor what someone is doing in a full time job as we may not be aware of it”.
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License-expired drivers bearing the paraphernalia of a taxi including a sign on the roof of their minibus could happily drive your kids to and from school. The minibus has cleared to hold five people contained 13 kids squished / swaying inside. Yes, I'm sure their parents don't mind too much....
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You can easily rent out a taxi to drive random passengers. All you need is a drivers licence, insurance cover and 140 euro. Feck the legislation, the PSV licence, Tax Clearance Certificate and what not.
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Hello corruption. If you've got a seriously defective taxi vehicle, no worries. Just bribe your way into the NCT system and you'll pass with flying colours....all for just a mere 100euro. There was one car - a taxi that you and I may have sat in - that was so horrifically defected, it was too dangerous to even finish the private safety test, but was passed by the trustworthy NCT for an exchange of cash . As read in thejournal.ie, John Ussher of the Taxi Driver’s Federation told Morning Ireland that to see cars pass the NCT even though they are not roadworthy is “frightening”. He added that there are rules and laws in place “but you can’t legislate for the back door of the NCT”. He said that back door has to be closed and that as a representative body the federation “will look for meetings to prevent this sort of thing happening again”. Ussher added that “there’s not enough enforcement officers, there’s not enough enforcement” and that this has to be improved.
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There are 42000 licensed drivers, 25000 vehicles, and 9 inspectors for the whole lot of them. However these 9 inspectors do not check the safety of the vehicles because that is the reponsibility of the gardaí and the NCT, as according to Taxi Regulator Kathleen Doyle. Doesn't that raise a little alarm somewhere ?

On top of that I'm hating how people have a go at the "non-irish" and "foreigners" when the situation arises. It was funny and sad to watch one woman in the audience of The Frontline with Pat Kenny last night say that she'd be afraid to question the taxi drivers because they were foreign, or they don't speak good English. Then a rather gentlemanly Pakistani taxi driver with fairly good English was questioned regarding racism -.- I mean fair enough, if they don't know their way or something, yes they should not be driving a taxi, but being afraid of them ? Seriously, how much percentage of the crooks and rapist drivers are foreigners again ?

I'm also annoyed at how the interviews were refused at the time.....and how they got away with refusing it. Don't we, the general public of a "democratic country" deserve a little more explanation than that ? Maybe it's something to do with the immediate response to a mistake / attitude of pushing the blame onto something else. Y'know guys, the "I'm shocked on hearing that, I had no idea. I'll say I take part of the responsibility but a lot of it is beyond my control." OR "Ah we've done our best. Why give ourselves such a hard time, sure our system is already better than so-and-so, they're a lot worse off than us...." etc etc. I think what we really needed here is someone to stand up and say "ok, I'm sorry for causing so much distress, I am responsible. This should not have happened. I will take that on board and will aim to make the changes necessary to improve this situation ASAP". Then we'll be reassured. Then there will be development in this field. Then there will be a regrowth of belief in the system and we can proudly answer "YES !" to the opening question of this blog.

And much less of us folks having to watch over most of our innocent, hard-working, honest taxi drivers with curious, doubtful and slightly fearful paranoid eyes o.O