Dessie Ellis (Dublin North West, Sinn Fein)

I am pleased to learn the report has been completed. The Minister of State should study it as quickly as possible before making its contents available to Members. While I made one submission on behalf of my party, many good submissions were made by others. Many taxi drivers feel under pressure and must be reassured that Members are considering the issues they raised. For example, over the Christmas period, it was reported by many taxi drivers that people were using false identity cards to collect passengers and that this practice was widespread. Moreover, for some reason there was no proper management or supervision over the Christmas period and no one was checking to ascertain whether this was happening. Perhaps this was because it was Christmas, but it is unacceptable and should never happen. Other issues arise in respect of taxis and I draw the Minister of State's attention to the fact that while the identification that is displayed on the screens of the taxis is in English on one side, there is no Irish on the other side. It would be a good idea to have bilingual identification on the taxis and the Minister could put this proposal into the mix. I do not believe this has been done previously.

I welcome the Minister of State's intention to release this report. The Joint Committee on Environment, Transport, Culture and the Gaeltacht probably will have sight of the report before anyone else and its members will study it. I look forward to reading it and I certainly hope it will address many of the taxi drivers' concerns.

See this speech in context