Tonight saw our taxi drivers turn out to the Council Committee meeting where for the first time ever the Committee were considering objections made by our association. I had to declare an interest and leave the room but 20 minutes later it was all over and the some of the objections were upheld and the Head of regulatory services was unable to explain some of his figures. The Leader of the Council led the questioning and apparently he was not happy that the Committee had not been in possession of all the facts when making their decision to increase our fees by 25% in June. The vote was 7 - 1 in favour of over turning their previous decision and deferring until time recording has been done again. He was not happy with the 40% figure for the policy review being included. Our next objective is to ensure that the time recording is carried out correctly and not in the same way because obviously that would just give the same result. It was good to see independent drivers turn out in support of our association and this small victory is hopefully going to be the catalyst to move on to greater victories in the future. It has taken us 4 years to get to this stage so you will all have to forgive me for the size of the smile on my face tonight.
