captain cab wrote:
Thanks Bloodnock, I get the picture.
However, at risk from wrath from above;
Restrictions on hours worked.
David Farmer raised this point which had reared its head some time ago as a result of an EU directive. The question is as to whether the trade felt that there was an argument for restricting hours. This has come to the fore because of a Parliamentary Question raised by the MP for Bradford, Eric Pickles. Apparently one of his constituents has been seriously hurt in an accident where the taxi driver who was driving the vehicle that the person was in had worked a very long shift and might thus not have been as vigilant as he should have been.
Mr Conyon made the point that if hours were restricted people would only work at busy times. This would leave a situation where it may be difficult to obtain taxis at other times. Mr Conyon raised the question of the definition of “working hours”. A situation had been put that a hackney carriage driver who was waiting on the rank would be deemed as “working” and thus would be in a situation where the 48 hours or whatever figure was fixed would be running against him. It had been suggested that a private hire driver, sitting in his private hire office, would not be deemed to be working.
On balance, the Association’s view is that for obvious economic reasons and because it was thought that most drivers who worked long hours were sensible enough to take breaks, any restrictions on hours would be unwise especially in the present climate.
Fair comment.....Its odd to say though that a PH sitting in his office might be deemed not to be working...if that held true the Days I spend "Sitting in my Office" Doing my accounts isnt working either i guess, yet if I paid someone else to do the Books they might see it somewhat differently as would the future EU work hours directive people.
Could I not argue that as a one man band that all the hours I spend sitting in the office waiting for a booking were going against me in exactly the same way as a Hack sitting in a rank for hours would go against them. Im sure sitting for possibly hours at time in a rank is as Tedious and sleep inducing if not more Tedious and sleep inducing than sitting in an office.
Unless both PH and Hacks are allowed the exact same amount of driving time then it starts to become an Imbalance and raises questions as to the legalities that Prejudices between the Two forms of transportation.
If they tried that Crap Id suddenly and Miraculously not be spending any time in the Office and my every living minute would be for driving only....
the thing with being a self employed person is that if you have no money making work to do you wont have any other related work to do either...EG..no Income no need for accounts..or no Driving no cars to clean and hoover out.
Yet if your Moderately succesful and get say 44 hours of driving a week you would never ever get the time to do all the other jobs that are required to service and maintain your business. as you realitically have no choice but to carry out a fair proprtion of non driving hour jobs This in turn would also make it difficult if your a PH driver to service his customers needs adequately and to maintain that the public do not endure difficulties in getting a Ph vehicle with the few remaining workable hours you may have left after youve spent 20 hours on the Mundane non Driving work......that Argument holds good whether your PH or Hack....some rural areas just Dont need Taxis as they have thousands of Miles of rural roads with no ranks and No passing taxis to be hailed...areas where only PH is viable.
It has to be the same rule for Both groups..good or bad.
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