The LTDA's no-holds-barred anti-minicab poster has fallen foul of advertising watchdog the ASA.

The Licensed Taxi Drivers Association (LTDA), the largest London black cab representative group, has fallen foul of advertising watchdog the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) over a summer anti-minicab poster campaign featured at prominent locations in the capital.

The poster stated: "233 sexual assaults and 54 rapes committed by minicab drivers - what's he got to smile about?", and an accompanying picture showed a beaming Sir John Stevens, the Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS).

The ASA was responding to complaints from the minicab trade, the MPS and members of the public.  In an adjudication published last month it upheld three complaints but rejected two others.

One complaint was that the advert was offensive to legitimate minicab drivers.  The ASA rejected the LTDA's defence that such drivers would not be offended because they had not carried out attacks and therefore had no reason to be offended, on the grounds that the poster failed to differentiate between minicab drivers acting legally and the unlicensed touts who carried out such attacks, and thus denigrated legitimate drivers.

The ASA also upheld complaints that the statistics included in the poster were misleading, on the grounds that the figure quoted for sexual assaults also included the number of rapes, whereas the advert implied that the figure of 233 sexual assaults excluded the 54 rapes.

An MPS complaint that the Commissioner's photograph was used in the particular context without permission was also upheld.

However, complaints that the advertisement implied that the MPS and the Commissioner did not take sexual attacks seriously, and a complaint that it caused undue fear and distress, were rejected.

Double standards?
The poster generated a great deal of resentment among sections of the London minicab trade and elsewhere.  One critical source commented: "Many in the black cab trade don't even want minicabs licensed, so what have they got to smile about?"

Click here to view LTDA's poster

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