Taxi Driver Online

December 8, 2007 Saturday

Councillors get tough on dangerous taxi cabs

Worcester News

TAXIS with exploding brake cables and wobbly steering columns have been discovered in the latest round of spot-checks in Worcester.

Now plans are being drawn up to triple the number of mandatory inspections each taxi must undergo every year from one to three, after recent sting operations by Worcester City Council officers revealed a sizeable minority of cabbies are still driving around the streets of Worcester in faulty vehicles.

The two most recent spot checks saw 14 of the 36 vehicles tested in September and five of the 16 tested in October failing to meet the necessary standards. "On each occasion we've done these tests we've had two or three vehicles served with immediate suspension notices, taking them straight off the road," said the council's environmental services manager Martin Gillies.

"These are faults which should have been picked up by the drivers - the cars were in a dangerous condition.

"One of the cabs was put onto a rolling road and when we tested the brakes, all the brake cables blew and squirted brake fluid everywhere. That cannot be allowed.

"On a previous occasion a steering column on a vehicle was loose - you could actually move the steering wheel from side to side."

Mr Gillies said further vehicles had been found with minor faults such as broken lights or leaking brake fluid.

"The problem seems to be the maintenance of vehicles by a minority of owners," he said. "The only way we can address that is to put together a programme of regular checks throughout the course of the year."

Your Worcester News first reported on concerns about the state of the city's taxis back in March, when 40 per cent of cabs tested in random spot-checks were deemed unroadworthy.

Members of the city licensing committee have now requested plans be drawn up to increase the number of annual inspections each cab must undertake from one to three.

"I think we need a new policy," said Coun Patricia Agar. "Essentially, what we are doing has not worked - we have not raised standards. We need to look at whether a systematic approach would work better."

However, the plan was criticised by the secretary of the Worcester Taxi Drivers' Association, Anne Murphy, who represents many of the city's 294 licensed drivers.

"Basic education about maintaining standards is what's needed," she said. "It's not enough just to say that a vehicle must comply with standards on certain days. What about the rest of the year?

"If somebody doesn't really understand why this is important or what the thinking is behind it, and what the punishment will be, then the bad apples won't change."
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