Over & Out wrote:
Jasbar, have you really read any of Mr Waters postings cause if you have you would realise he wasn't an operator he's a driver. So please explain Mr Taylor why would a driver be hell bent on "They are working to make sure that you work for them, as their chattlels, and that you will be denied access to the tools of your trade, if you ever decide that you want to drive your own vehicle, be your own man or woman, in the interests of your own family."
Although Mr Taylor maybe you could explain to the forum how when the shoe is on the other foot your view point is the complete reverse to what it is now and I quote
Jim Taylor, secretary of taxi trade lobby group CABforce, today said there was no need to "tinker" with the current set-up.
He said: "Taxis are readily available in Edinburgh about 95 per cent of the time so we do not believe there is an unmet demand.
"In Edinburgh, we have about as many taxis per head of population as London, where there are no restrictions at the moment."
CABforce also believes that easing the rules would result in hackneys catering for the disabled being replaced with "lowest-common denominator vehicles" such as saloon cars.
Mr Taylor added: "The quality and integrity of the trade will simply diminish."
Link below to the full article in the Scotsman
http://news.scotsman.com/scotland/Disse ... 2484739.jpNow Now Jasbar I think after reading the Scotsman your credibility on this forum has just went oot the windy

It is irrelevant what Waters' status is. It's irrelevant whether he is a prison "trusty", an establishment lackey or an "Uncle Tom". Fact is he is working to remove the rights of others, not enhance them. He is working to remove individual freedoms, not promote them. he will fail.
If experience of the cab trade has taught me anything it is the incredible desire of many to say nothing, to seek to curry favour with those they aspire to be, to doff the cap and touch their forelocks. This is Tony Waters'.
It is always dangerous to allow such individuals to hold ANY position of influence, because their effect is "Quisling", betrayal. They would expect those they would betray that because they hold a view, and they are the "same" as the rest of the group then what they are seeking to achieve is acceptable.
Here it is patently NOT. Capping taxis will not help Dundee's taxi drivers in the short term, the current poor economic climate, and will harm them further when the economy does pick up, the cab trade will hold back expansion to push owners' plate values up and PH will take ever more of taxi drivers' work. Dundee will end up with a static taxi trade and vastly superior numbers of PH. If you don't believe me, then just look to Glasgow where it has already happened. 1400 taxis and 3500 PH.
Waters has been asked to answer this, he can't. Waters has been asked to say how this cap will benefit drivers. He spat the dummy out because he can't, or won't.
As for the Cabforce quote guys, you really want to grow up. This was a different situation, in a different time, with different conditions.
You would seem to think that life affords each individual only one view. That further reasoning, taking account of difference conditions, experiences and understandings shouldn't permit a different view being formed. Were that the case, we'd still be Neanderthals wandering about chasing dinosaurs, we'd never have used our brains to develop into our contemporary society.
Since that quote, it didn't really take a "Saul on the road to Damascus" moment to realise the error of the view. What changed was:-
1. recognition of the oppressive control of the taxi companies
2. the denial of aspiration for individual advancement
3. reduced competition
4. growing private hire (400% as opposed to taxis 40% in Edinburgh)
5. poor management of the restriction policy by CEC who placed their own transport interests before those of the taxi trade
5. the burgeoning economy which saw PH flood onto the fleet, doing the work our trade should have had first tilt at
6. the corruption of the council who in our view undoubtedly "manufactured" evidence through corrupt surveys - Jacob failed to find a demand in a burgeoning economy while Halcrow found a demand in the deepest recession in 100 years. The whole process was a lie perpetrated by the vested interests. (We have been told, by the horse's mouth no less, that taxi company figures in the Stakeholder survey used by CEC to justify licence refusal, were fabricated to give the dersired result.)
7. The introduction of Taxi Marshals to manage the demand the companies, trade quislings and the council said didn't exist.
8. Plate values increasing to £50,000, rentals up to £350 per week, protecting the vested interests all while returns for drivers fall - all the pain borne by the workers, not by by the "mastes".
9. The awakening realisation of social justice through Human Rights.
That's just a few of the circumstances. I could add many more. But the gist is that circumstances change. My view changed. Restriction is a social evil perpetrated on drivers and the public with the aid of those in the trade who can't operate a business according to the same market conditions as every other commercial entity.
All of this despicably borne out by the peak period assaults of two women and the trade rallies to cry out that the restriction must stay, it was the females' own fault.
And that's why I despise this trade, and will do until there is some social justice restored. Until drivers can have every equal opportunity as is their right, now and into the future and their families' futures. And customers get a fair shake from drivers who know that what they sow they will reap, masters of their OWN destinies.
All of this Tony Waters and his henchmen would deny us.