Ned O'Sullivan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State back to the House and commend him on being, as he said, the first Minister to initiate two items of legislation in the Seanad within as many months. That is a way of identifying the positive uses of the Seanad. We can be an important vehicle, if the Minister will pardon the pun, for legislation and if other Ministers took a leaf out of the Minister's book it would help us in a major way.

Fianna Fáil supports this Bill which is in line with our party policy. It is based to a great extent on the progress made under the two previous Fianna Fáil-led Administrations, with support from all sides of the House. We have the right to introduce amendments on Committee Stage which we may well do.

The Bill is quite detailed. Its purpose is to put into effect elements of the Taxi Regulation Act 2003 which were never commenced or put into operation. One has to wonder about the reason for the delay in putting those elements into the initial Bill which are only being acted upon now. I might be leaving myself open to a sucker punch in that regard as Fianna Fáil was in government for most of that time but the Minister might outline if there were any particular difficulties or legal problems or was it the case that the Government simply did not get around to doing it? It appears that the main elements of this Bill would be universally acceptable to the public and for that reason I would have thought their implementation would have been expedited but that did not happen.

I welcome the strengthening of the commitment to impose a regime that excludes persons convicted of certain categories of offences from being taxi drivers, as would every right-thinking person. The famous "Prime Time" programme, which accelerated activity on this front to a certain extent, highlighted that up to 6,000 taxi drivers, or one in every seven, had committed a criminal offence. Some of those offences were significant while others may have been minor but once again we are thankful to the media for a positive exposition of that situation which is very worrying.

The safety of the general public must be paramount in all our deliberations. It is very important that a person getting into the back of a taxi would feel they are in safe hands, especially elderly people and, without being sexist, women who are quite vulnerable to attack from rogue taxi drivers, and we have seen a good deal of evidence about that. I commend the Minister on every attempt he makes to ensure the public can have more confidence in taking taxis and that they would feel safer in them.

The regime of offences will have to be examined in more detail on Committee Stage.

I refer to two types of taxi drivers I have encountered and about which the public will be aware. Taxi driver A is a decent individual who is working hard to provide for his wife and family. Since the deregulation of taxis in 2000 he has found himself up against much more competition. He has to work harder and for longer, often unsocial hours in areas and conditions that he would not normally have wished to find himself in but because of the competition he no longer has a choice in the matter. As a result of those pressures he will be very vulnerable, especially late at night, in terms of people emerging from clubs and other areas under the influence of alcohol or drugs or both. Anybody who has been listening to Joe Duffy's radio programme in recent days will have heard harrowing experiences from taxi drivers who were being robbed of their fares, beaten up and virtually kidnapped and instructed to drive to out of the way locations where they are beaten again and left in terror of their lives. We heard from taxi drivers whose vehicles were urinated in or vandalised in many different ways. Those people are finding it very difficult to get through their shifts. That taxi driver has nothing to fear from this Bill. It is unfortunate that the Bill cannot legislate in some way for his protection to allow him ply his trade in safety.

I am aware the review group, under the Minister's chairmanship, did not agree to reintroduce capping. That is something that will have to be examined again, especially in the economic downturn, because there are so many taxis operating it is virtually a rat race and people are being forced to work in conditions that are not safe.

Taxi driver B is a different individual. He is the fellow who invariably has a dirty taxi with the radio playing at full blast who is impolite to and shows no respect for his customer. He often does not know his way around the city. One of the taxi drivers' own spokespersons stated that one third of the taxi drivers in Dublin do not have a clue where they are going, and every one of us has anecdotal evidence of that. I related a story in the previous Seanad that on a wet night I wanted to travel from the House to my apartment in Lower Liffey Street, which is just over the Ha'penny Bridge, but the taxi driver had never heard of it. I told him I would get off at Bachelor's Walk but he had never heard of that either. Finally, I told him to let me off at O'Connell Bridge and when I saw him going for his satellite navigation system I knew I was in trouble. He ended up driving up Grafton Street, which is one-way, and was apprehended by the gardaí. He then tried to charge me ¤15 for my troubles. That particular individual was a foreign national. There is not a racist bone in my body but there is a perception among the public that there are people driving taxis in Dublin who do not have a word of English and no clue about the city in which they are working. We all know that the taxi drivers in London must pass rigorous knowledge tests. Is there such a testing regime in this country? Is it being operated or is it a scam in that they are getting other people to do it for them?

There are taxi drivers in every city who take advantage of customers, especially foreigners. We all know the inventive ways they can find to bring one from the airport along circuitous routes and so on. That is very difficult to legislate for, and I note the Taxi Drivers Association has stated it would be 100% in favour of such individuals being outed and they would not get any support from that association.

The Bill refers to taxi ranks which have been a bugbear of mine for many years. Taxi stand regulation is long overdue. In this city alone the first one that comes to my mind is the taxi rank at Upper O'Connell Street opposite the Gresham Hotel. I have often witnessed potential customers being abused by taxi drivers for approaching what they thought was the head of a queue only to find that the head of the queue is virtually across the street and they have to cross O'Connell Street to get to it. We have all seen unseemly situations where taxi drivers are shouting at each other using colourful language, especially at that location. It occurs in Dame Street also which at night is virtually a sea of taxis. The taxi situation on Dawson Street is also very unsatisfactory. The Minister's idea of curtailing people joining the queue in an unauthorised fashion is something that I welcome to an extent. I can sympathise with a taxi driver who is trying to join that queue and where the traffic flow is reasonable one would excuse it but it must be tightened up in general. I welcome the use of CCTV cameras also.

I want to put an issue to the Minister which he might consider, namely, the introduction of some form of taxi marshal such as those used in airports, railway stations and so on in some of the major cities. It might help, and they could be funded partly by the taxi drivers themselves because it would be for their benefit and partly by the Taxi Regulator.

To my mind, a taxi marshal is required at Heuston Station. At Heuston there is an ideal sheltered waiting area for customers but the taxi drivers park 50 or 100 yards further down from it and expect the customer with suitcases to walk down to them in the rain. A taxi marshal could use his whistle to bring that to an abrupt end. I ask the Minister of State to consider that suggestion.

The Minister of State has probably examined the age rule for taxi vehicles which states no taxi should be over ten years old, but it is hard to legislate in respect of certain cars. I went to the airport in a state-of-the-art ten year old Jaguar. It was absolutely beautiful, with an all-leather interior. The driver's story was that he was being forced to trade that car in for a more up-to-date vehicle but as he could not afford to trade up financially, he will buy a five year old car, which will not be as customer friendly as the Jaguar. I wonder if more flexibility could be exercised in ruling on branded cars, as no matter how old they are, it is a pleasure to travel in them.

In the past the taxi service was confined to the city, whereas in country towns, a service was provided by the hackney driver, whom people would phone at his home and he would come and collect them. He could not hover around chip shops, pubs and the like. In most towns, taxi stands are being introduced and the town council in my own town recently introduced a stand in Listowel. It is probably one of the last towns to get a taxi stand. What impact will this have on hackney drivers? Is the hackney car on the way out? Is it possible to incorporate them in a different type of regime that would compensate them for their years of service and allow them to compete in a fair way? Traditionally in towns such as Listowel, the hackney driver got the business during the quiet times but during the Listowel Races, the taxis will travel from Tralee, Killarney and other places and take the business from them. Will the Minister of State comment on the future opportunities for hackney drivers?

Members of the Fianna Fail Party have a quibble on the transfer of the single plate licence within a family. We will table amendments on Committee Stage. The review body has not agreed to family transfers and this places the single plate owner at a disadvantage compared to the multiple, who operates on a company basis and the licence can become an asset of the company and therefore it has a transferable value in that respect. If a person who has a plate were to die suddenly - I welcome the reference to this problem at the tail end of the Minister of State's speech - his wife and family, sons and daughters cannot take over the licence and that is what provided their bread and butter. I would like the Minister of State to give that scenario some more consideration.

I wish the Minister of State well and we will return to these points on Committee Stage