Taxi Driver Online

Cardiff cabbies angry at MoT plans


CABBIES say they will fight Cardiff council in the courts to stop a proposed move for all taxi MoT testing to be carried out in-house by the authority.

Taxi drivers have been allowed to take their cabs to any of the city’s MoT garages to test their roadworthiness since 2010.

The council Licensing Department, however, says the standard of the capital’s taxi fleet has since deteriorated, with the number of warnings almost doubling last year to 1,303. The number of stop notices served by licensing enforcement officers for faulty vehicles also increased from 67 in 2009-10 to 128 in 2010-11.

The major area of concern is the vehicle’s Declaration of Fitness, which is carried out in addition to the MoT to inspect the vehicles’ interior, paintwork and other fittings.

A report to be considered by the council’s Public Protection Committee next week suggests a stricter testing regime could be introduced to raise standards.

Proposals include limiting testing to only those stations approved by the authority, or for all tests to be undertaken solely by the council.

Cardiff Hackney Carriage Association and the Union of Taxi Drivers said the proposals are “anti-competitive” and vowed to take the authority to court should they be approved.

Cardiff Hackney Carriage Association chairman Mathab Khan said drivers currently paid £35-£40 to have their vehicle tested, with re-testing free of charge. If testing was carried out by the council at its transport services depot on Clare Road, the authority says it will charge £57.30 per test and £40 for retests.

Mr Khan said: “The council are planning to take it in-house to raise more revenue from the drivers; that is their motivation.”

Abdi Ahmed, chairman of the Union of Taxi Drivers, said in-house testing of cabs would cause delays as the authority would struggle to cope with demand.

But private hire firm Premier Cars has called for the council to be the only testing facility, describing the proposal as “fair and impartial”.

Council committee chairman Ed Bridges said: “We are trying to make sure Cardiff has a safe taxi fleet that is subject to a thorough inspection. “There are different ways to achieve it and we are looking at that.”


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Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.
George Carlin

That idea I don't like.


However if that's what is being proposed I can't see a problem.

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IDFIMH

That's what we have. We used to only have one authorised garage but now we have a choice of 3. I think if drivers can go to any garage it's open to abuse

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Note to self: Just because it pops into my head does NOT mean it should come out of my mouth!!

Cardiff Hackney Carriage Association chairman Mathab Khan said drivers currently paid £35-£40 to have their vehicle tested, with re-testing free of charge. If testing was carried out by the council at its transport services depot on Clare Road, the authority says it will charge £57.30 per test and £40 for retests.

Not best value


But private hire firm Premier Cars has called for the council to be the only testing facility, describing the proposal as “fair and impartial”.

Governments best practice says 2 testing stations

First and foremost you have to look at the overall situation!

Before this freedom first came about you could have up to a six week wait to get your car/cab plated the cost in comparison to a normal MOT place is also exceptionally high - so it fails two fold.

A year or so down the line it now stacks up that Cardiff hackneys over a five year period have more than doubled from 450 hacks to over 957 - a nice little earner for them! If you then take into consideration that they are trying to claw back this lost business causing a massive financial loss then in effect it would make the council biased. They are now looking into vehicles more thoroughly on a more regular basis to make it look worse than what it is, you also have to take into account that because of the increase in driver license fees (over twice as much as they did five years ago) that they now receive, that they are now able to do more checks of which they never did before (this being self funded by the drivers) again making the stats look worse by stating that the year on year failures are getting worse.

The bottom line being is that the drivers have had their income (cake wise) cut by over 50% and the recession has on top of this taken another chunk, we have also fallen from (I think) 53 rd in the national ranking table to around 140 odd out of 300 +! So it is possible that drivers up and down the country are not able to maintain their cars/cabs due to deregulation/fuel increases/recession that has caused a vast drop in income, on this situation I do see it mentioned that a drop in standards in many areas up and down the U.K. has happened, so this is not just peculiar to Cardiff, if that is the case then they need to take a look at themselves - not the MOT stations.

It is also made to look worse than what it is because society has become more violent, and the downside is that drivers cars/cabs are getting kicked/battered by the punters = NOT UP TO STANDARD + one must look at the reasons of apparent failure! I believe that most will not be down to serious safety issues! the odd lighting issue, yes one or two re tyres (but that has always happened) and the rest will be cosmetic.

You have to take on board that they are basically saying that 1) MOT stations in general are corrupt, Or 2) the standard is not high enough! and are therefore challenging the the Department of Government that set the standards!

As far as I am concerned, if a standard has been set by a government department to cover vehicles...............then it has got to be good enough for Taxis/P.H vehicles.They are in essence accusing others (government authorised MOT stations) in multiple that they are bending the rules..............I cannot see that as their test is not a lot different and neither would they compromise their status .

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if you cannot be yourself, then who can you be.

IMO the council will pick up on things a normal MOT station will miss like ripped seats, carpets, dents and scratches, dirty interior etc etc.

If the Councils dropped their charges and stopped the 6 weeks waiting time Cardiff used to have they'd be halfway to providing a decent service.

What the council are saying, I think, is that they wish to approve all taxi/PH testing stations. They aren't putting a limit on how many.

Makes plenty of sense to me.

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IDFIMH