Brendan Griffin (Kerry South, Fine Gael)
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To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport his views on the penalties that the Taxi Regulator imposes on taxi drivers for relatively minor offences; his plans to review the workings of the Taxi Regulator; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [39215/12]

Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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The matter of the penalties for taxi offences was examined as part of Taxi Regulation Review last year. The Review in its final report considered that the current regulations which have established a single financial penalty level of €250 for certain specified breaches of the current industry regulations were not appropriate and were resulting in very minor infringements incurring the same fine as more significant violations.

Action 25 of the Review Report, which is to be implemented in the short term, proposes the introduction of a graduated system of fixed charge penalties to replace the current single penalty charge and this will enable the tailoring of the penalty charge to more closely reflect the significance of the particular infringement to which it refers.  The implementation arrangements are to be agreed between my Department, the Gardaí and the National Transport Authority.