Taxi Driver Online

Toilets.

It's a pound to park for an hour, in central London that's cheap. They would do better to campaign for the ranks to be free of shysters who treat them like personal shopping spaces.




The story: From BBC London.

Taxi protest over toilet parking


(A tiny minority of) London taxi drivers are to stage a protest at parking charges they claim cost them £3 just to use the toilet.

Drivers said they have to pay a minimum of £3 to park and go to the toilet or risk a fine of £80, complaining there are not enough taxi-only bays. (It's a pound)

The RMT union wants Westminster City Council to waive parking fees for 10 minutes for black cabs on bays close to public toilets.

The council said it is creating rest ranks where drivers can park for free.

London taxi drivers will be picketing Westminster City Council for an hour from 1430 BST.

The Rail Maritime and Transport Union's general secretary Bob Crow said: "Black taxi drivers provide an essential service for Londoners and Westminster should play fair and cut our members some slack with the parking enforcement to enable them to park up and do the necessary."

Westminster councillor Danny Chalkley said: "This particular group does not have the backing of the three main bodies which represent the taxi trade, including the London Taxi Drivers Association, and has not made contact with the council to raise its concerns.

"If they had they would realise that Westminster does more than any other borough to help the taxi trade and that we are currently working on the creation of the first ever designated rest ranks in the capital, where taxi drivers will be able to park for free."




I love it, a trade which predominantly hates the left and people like Ken Livingstone, now has about 200 drivers represented by committed Socialist in the shape of Bob Crow.

But have you ever seen a poor train driver?

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IDFIMH

And as if by magic, we have the perfect solution.

http://www.cctv.com/english/special/exc ... 7959.shtml

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IDFIMH

No, not for their 34 hour week, but then the public don't give a sheeite if we go on strike.

I wonder if the RMT Taxi members will be out along with their rail 'brothers' tonight, or will they be grabbing all the extra work their 'brothers' strike has created?

I suspect the leaders will be out on the picket line, and the rest will be thinking lovely jubbley.

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IDFIMH

That's no good if you've had a kebab on the Saturday night.

Well a whole 10 people turned out for London's 'fastest' growing socialist representative taxi group.

http://www.thelondondailynews.com/rattl ... -2961.html

It'll also be the quickest to shrink when drivers witness the hidden political agenda's such organisations thrive on.

Stagnation comes to mind.

The point is, why should you have to pay ? It's a basic human need to have to use the loo and WCC are using it as an excuse to raise revenue. Once the royal oak is gone there will be many more cabbies looking for somewhere to go to toilet and in Westminster that equates to a very tidy sum.

I'm not in the RMT but commend then on their intiative in taking WCC to task about this. You may be happy to spend £1 a time for a 5 minute loo break but over the week that will equate to between £20 and £40 of your hard earned cash going into WCC coffers so they can invest in yet more cameras and wardens to penalise you and me........money well spent ? I think not!

You mention ranks, well how many ranks are so well placed to be near toilet facilities ? You say that the shysters are off doing their shopping; i grant you that there are an element of drivers doing exactly that and it needs to be addressed but also i'm sure a great many drivers are off trying to find a toilet.

We used to be able to park up, use a loo; allow a customer to use an ATM; pop into a sandwich bar and buy a sarnie but now all of that is seen as a viable means of revenue collection! You seemingly seem happy with that ? You are quite happy to swell the coffers of WCC for answering the call of nature ? You make some valid points GBC but sometimes i really do wonder why you seem to want to be at odds with your own colleagues ? Tell me, if it had been the LTDA who had organised this demonstration would you have been so against the proposal?



I went along, not as a member of the RMT (i'm in the LTDA) and not because i'm that affected by the constraints imposed on drivers by WCC as i'm a night worker and generally find it ok to park up and use the loo (when i can find one!), i went along because i'm sick to the back teeth of the local authorities seeing us as easy pickings! I'm sick of hearing of taxi drivers being penalised by WCC for stopping at an ATM for a customer! I'm fed up of them being pernicious and vindictive not to mention highly selective when it comes to enforcing their parking regulations; stop at an ATM, get fined! PH touting in the haymarket, turn a blind eye!

If the action can kick start negotiations with WCC and the relevent trade bodies (i include LTDA, LCDC, UNITE and the RMT) then surely it's a good thing. I was out there for myself, my colleagues and remarkably even for you GBC, if anything positive comes out of it then you will benefit as much as any of us or will you still be willing to give them your pound to take a leak ?

Perhaps it's time to stop being a troll, stop being anti-everything and stand up alongside your fellow cabbies. The issues affect you as much as anyone else in this job.

Be lucky.............

The offer still stands if you want to check out the cab.

Losty, you are gonna need a toilet to get some paper for all that dribbling you are doing.

There were between 60 - 80 Taxis involved in this action, possibly more. Not 10 like you and your Holiday Club chums would like to think.

Tell Silent Bob to give us a wave as we pass him on the way down!

Cheers Dizzy.

It's the invasion of the LTDF.

Bored over there Dizzy?

I knew you'd miss me, no one to argue against the 8 anti – LTDA gang members. That's the way forums go though, you need opposites to stimulate debate, now you have about 20 regular posters all agreeing with each other.

Be lucky.

PS. Did you leave the LTDA?

Good post Mr acabbie, but I don't think you'll find a council anywhere in the country that is so accommodating when it comes to listening and acting on ideas' from the trade on such a consistent basis.

Just ask any of the hundreds of Taxi drivers from the provinces that post here on TDO if their councils even provide rank spaces never mind rest rank spaces. Brighton Station is another classic.

Some folks want more and more, and will never be satisfied with the efforts of the trade bodies or the local council, that’s life, and perhaps a hundred drivers out of twenty five thousand shows just how strongly the majority think about the RMT and it's priorities.

Will you be backing their choice of Mayoral Candidate come the next election, as he or she will probably be somewhere to the left of the last incumbent?

As a self employed Taxi driver, just like you and Dizzy, I'm allowed to hold whatever views or opinions that I may wish to, and I maintain the right to post them on here without fear of alteration or accusations that happened on a regular basis over on the LTDF forum.
That's why I'll never post there again, nor take part in any 'action' that’s mooted. That's great news for the 8 gang members.

I'll stick to the LTDA, just like the other 8300 'mugs' that choose to pay £16 to London’s best trade representative body.

Hope the Mercs doing well.

Cheers.

I resent those comments.

You have a right to reply, a right to free speech and a right to hold what views you wish, none of which were ever doctored or altered to my knowledge. There are 4 of us who moderate on that forum and i can tell you now i've met 2 of them and they may not agree with your or indeed my views but they, as i would never alter your comments to change the context.



As i've stated numerous times i'm also a paid up member of the LTDA, incidentally which party do they vote for ? I seem to recall them being very pro Ken at the last mayoral election! Its crazy to suggest because someone is a member of the RMT that you MUST back their choice for mayoral candidate; did you vote for Ken ? Who does Bob Oddy, Barry Hooper or Steve MacNamara vote for ? Does it alter or sway your judgement ? I had you down for being smarter than that! If i ever became a member of the RMT (considering it but not fully convinced just yet) my choice of political party would remain the same; i do have the choice and anybody telling me i should vote one way or another would be in for a very rude awakening.



Perhaps i'm just pi**ing in the wind with my idelologies and need to wake up to the fact that we are the lowest common denominator when it comes to Londons transport infrastructure but i'm prepared to put myself out in the hope that just maybe someone in authority will take our concerns seriously..........its's for my benefit and yours; is that so bad ?



So far, so good. Running well, no serious issues and coming up to the first (4000k) check over in the next few weeks.

I'll have you know it's the fastest growing cab union in London.

http://www.thelondondailynews.com/very- ... -2960.html

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IDFIMH

Like this one?

You have to remember John Kennedys one of these drivers who's been a member of every trade body that's existed, and been a member of every Radio Circuit that's ever existed and none of them are good enough for John, they're all wrong.

Give it a couple of years and the RMT will be put into that bracket as well.

Johns too good to be a Taxi driver, he should get his own radio phone in show, or take up a career as an actor like the LCDC's Grant Davis.