Taxi Driver Online

Like last year, someone in publishing has picked up on the latest DfT stats, and a couple of pieces have appeared in the local/regional press. This may be of local interest, but from the national perspective it's classic churnalism and boilerplate, with the local titles just plugging in their figures and maybe a bit of rearranging the quotes etc

But it's the same quotes and essentially the same narrative in both pieces, so expect quite a few similar articles in the next few days. Which personally I'll probably just ignore, unless something particularly interesting jumps out


Fewer taxis running in Blackburn than before pandemic

https://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/n ... -pandemic/

Fewer private hire vehicles are transporting passengers through Blackburn with Darwen's streets than before the coronavirus pandemic, new figures show.

The GMB Union said running taxis and pre-booked cars has become more expensive due to a "perfect storm" of problems, including the cost-of-living crisis, the coronavirus pandemic and licensing issues.

A private hire vehicle, such as those available through Uber, must be pre-booked and cannot ply for hire, whereas a taxi, such as a traditional black cab, can be hailed down and is usually charged on a timed meter.

Department for Transport figures show there were 747 private hire vehicles in Blackburn with Darwen as of March – down from 862 the year before and below 936 in March 2020.

Across England and Wales, the total number of private vehicles increased in the last year following a significant drop in 2021 – though it is still well below the number of vehicles on the roads before the pandemic.

There were 236,000 private hire vehicles in 2020, dropping to 197,000 last year before rebounding to 208,000 this year.

Yaseen Aslam, president of the App Drivers and Couriers Union, which represents private hire drivers, said: "A lot of people stopped driving during the pandemic as they became couriers and decided it was more cost-effective.

Mr Aslam said low pay sometimes attached to working for a private hire vehicle company is another issue, adding that a cap on the total number of licensed drivers should be introduced to protect against increasingly lower fares.

"When they try and make it unlimited, it is not sustainable," he added.

Meanwhile, the number of taxis nationally has continued to fall every year since 2017, from 80,500 to 62,300 this year – and GMB is concerned about the number of drivers leaving the industry.

Steve Garelick, GMB regional organiser, said: "Taxi driving has got more expensive in recent years - and licensing isn't helping to support drivers.

"Whether it is fuel costs, or how expensive electric vehicles are, overheads are a struggle.

"Through the pandemic, many moved into other industries, and only now is demand picking back up fully, and drivers returning."

But the number of taxis in Blackburn with Darwen has bucked the trend, remaining steady at 70 in the last year and is now in line with before the pandemic.

Of the taxis available in March, all were wheelchair accessible, while 21 private hire vehicle offered disabled access.

The figures also show there are now 1,084 licences for taxi and private hire drivers in the area – below 1,115 in 2020.

Nationally, the number of total licenses has dropped from 376,700 in 2020 to 341,300.

GMB expressed its support for drivers who have left the industry.

Mr Garelick said: "GMB will always stand with drivers for better terms and conditions in their roles."

Fewer taxis and pre-booked cars in Dacorum than before pandemic

https://www.hemeltoday.co.uk/news/trans ... ic-3782902

A union says that private hire vehicles are more costly due to a ‘perfect storm’ of issues

Fewer private hire vehicles are transporting passengers through Dacorum's streets than before the coronavirus pandemic, new figures show.

The GMB Union said running taxis and pre-booked cars has become more expensive due to a "perfect storm" of problems, including the cost-of-living crisis, the coronavirus pandemic and licensing issues.

A private hire vehicle, such as those available through Uber, must be pre-booked and cannot ply for hire, whereas a taxi, such as a traditional black cab, can be hailed down and is usually charged on a timed meter.

Department for Transport figures show there were 112 private hire vehicles in Dacorum as of March – down from 115 the year before and below 159 in March 2020.

Across England and Wales, the total number of private vehicles increased in the last year following a significant drop in 2021 – though it is still well below the number of vehicles on the roads before the pandemic.

There were 236,000 private hire vehicles in 2020, dropping to 197,000 last year before rebounding to 208,000 this year.

Yaseen Aslam, president of the App Drivers and Couriers Union, which represents private hire drivers, said: "A lot of people stopped driving during the pandemic as they became couriers and decided it was more cost-effective.

Mr Aslam said low pay sometimes attached to working for a private hire vehicle company is another issue, adding that a cap on the total number of licensed drivers should be introduced to protect against increasingly lower fares.

"When they try and make it unlimited, it is not sustainable," he added.

Meanwhile, the number of taxis nationally has continued to fall every year since 2017, from 80,500 to 62,300 this year – and GMB is concerned about the number of drivers leaving the industry.

Steve Garelick, GMB regional organiser, said: "Taxi driving has got more expensive in recent years - and licensing isn't helping to support drivers.

"Whether it is fuel costs, or how expensive electric vehicles are, overheads are a struggle.

"Through the pandemic, many moved into other industries, and only now is demand picking back up fully, and drivers returning."

The number of taxis in Dacorum has also continued to fall, from 225 in 2017 to 184 in 2022 .

Of the taxis available in March, just 21 were wheelchair accessible, while two private hire vehicle offered disabled access.

The figures also show there are now 331 licences for taxi and private hire drivers in the area – below 383 in 2020.

Nationally, the number of total licenses has dropped from 376,700 in 2020 to 341,300.

GMB expressed its support for drivers who have left the industry.

Mr Garelick said: "GMB will always stand with drivers for better terms and conditions in their roles.”

The problem for some is the drop in drivers, not the drop in vehicles.

Me, I'm not the slightest bit concerned.

_________________
IDFIMH

Interesting that most the articles on this are about 'private hire' vehicles in the headlines:


Fewer private hire vehicles in Teignbridge than before pandemic


Fewer private hire vehicles in Winchester than before pandemic


Fewer private hire vehicles in Bradford than before pandemic


Fewer private hire vehicles in Bedford than before pandemic


There is the odd slight variation in the headline, though

Private hire vehicles decrease in Oldham post-pandemic


And in some areas numbers of PHVs haven't even gone down. But it would be interesting to maybe investigate why, but I can't even be bothered reading the article:

Private hire vehicles in Basingstoke and Deane remained steady during pandemic


This one's a bit of an outlier, though

Preston taxis: more private hire vehicles in Preston than before pandemic


Who knows, but anytime I've ever looked into the DfT figures in depth there's usually some quite obvious errors, although I think they've ironed a lot of that stuff out over the years.

Of course, some areas might actually be bucking the trend, but there could be specific local reasons for that, like removing a knowledge test for drivers or relaxing an age rule for cars, but that sort of stuff isn't usually available without doing a bit of time consuming-digging. And the digging is often down a bit of a rabbit hole, so maybe best not to look to closely at some of these things

(Forgot about this, which was drafted a few day ago. Not much news around today, so some may find this vaguely interesting, but I doubt if many will )


I'd forgotten from last year that the Press Association news agency seems to be the source of all this stuff, so they'll either tailor the pieces for the local outlets using the DfT stats, or just provide the template and quotes etc, and leave it to the local outlets to plug in the numbers and change the headlines and text accordingly

And it looks like PA has supplied a photo, which, given that the article are mainly focused on private hire, isn't perhaps the best image to illustrate the pieces, but no change there.

Anyway, don't normally like repeating photos and huge lumps of text without good reason, but here it maybe puts the photo captions used in context, and demonstrates their misleading nature. Of course, they really have to be viewed in the context of the article as a whole, but that would be far too much repetition

Anyways, here are some of the captions used for the photos:



Harrogate has fewer private hire vehicles than before pandemic



Fewer private hire taxis in Warrington than before Covid (Image: PA)



Private hire vehicle numbers are lower now than before the pandemic. Picture: PA



Credit by Zac Goodwin (PA Archive )



A taxi rank near the train station in Nottingham during England's third national lockdown to curb the spread of coronavirus. Picture date: Monday January 18, 2021.


The local outlets for the first two photos should be obvious from the captions.

The third one is from the Bradford Telegraph & Argus.

The fourth captioned 'Credit by Zac Goodwin (PA Archive )' is from the Teignmouth Post & Gazette

To be fair at least it doesn't say 'private hire' in the photo caption, but this is the headline and strapline:


Fewer private hire vehicles in Teignbridge than before pandemic

Fewer private hire vehicles are transporting passengers through Teignbridge's streets than before the coronavirus pandemic, new figures show.


The last one is the odd one out, because it actually states more precisely that it's a taxi rank in Nottingham, thus the caption isn't strictly speaking incorrect, but again the headline and article as a whole is mainly about private hire. And it's in the Basingstoke Gazette