work closely with the council so when the relationship breaks down it can be very frustrating. Still, the speed of the outcome of this does go a long way in restoring that working relationship. Whilst we praise the council for acting quickly, we are still seeking accountability from the council for the lack of any official stakeholder consultation with the local taxi trade to ensure that this does not happen again.”


I think that is fair enough….


As such, within twenty-four hours the rank was back and fully marked up, but not before the local press got hold of the story and it was headline news the same day. I think it was totally justified to still have this featured to show the public the incompetence of the council, even though the mistake was rectified.


However, on principle I escalated the complaint to Stage 2 on the basis that throughout the various emails going back and forth, at no time had the council admitted responsibility for failing to carry out a full and proper stakeholder consultation with the trade and had just offered weak excuses.


I feel very strongly that in principle there must be accountability, and for an undertaking to be given that this will never happen again which must be recorded at the Trade Forum meeting for future reference.


My follow up press statement made matters clear:


“The Stage 1 complaint was immediately lodged as it was indicated to us by the Projects Manager that this was an experimental traffic order with the consultation open until November 1st. So, we’re not prepared to standby whilst out-of-town Uber cars use the then marked loading bay during that time to rank up on. However, it is very obvious that the council realised that they did not undertake the correct procedure of a full consultation with the local taxi trade. Consequently, the council acted swiftly to resolve the matter to restore the long-established rank back to its 24-hour status for the drivers to use whenever it suited. We have always striven to


PHTM JUNE 2025


Uber reinventing the cab trade again A few years ago, shortly after Uber arrived on our shores, it made a big thing about bringing in something new with a fanfare of trumpets. The bods at Uber sat around the table and came up with ‘scheduling’ or as the rest of us know it as plain and simple ‘pre-booking’. One would have really thought that Uber had come up with some kind of sensational, never heard of before innovation. But no, they just tried to reinvent people pre-booking a cab.


However, in the small print it also stated that scheduling would not always guarantee a car would turn up. At the time it was explained that all that scheduling did was enable the users’ phone to send out a request for a car just before the booking was required; so I suppose in one way it was slightly different in that a scheduled job was never guaranteed to turn up which is not really a fit and proper service, especially when you need to catch a train.


Well, Uber is now back into that whizzo innovation mode again and has come up with what they consider to be revolutionary. After running a trial, it is now offering users the option to.....pay in cash. My goodness! Why didn’t that cab trade offer this years ago! Interestingly, the word on the street is that Uber drivers don’t want to carry cash so let’s see how that pans out.


Ending on Uber, as someone whose only qualifications were an ‘E’ in geography and an ‘A level’ in art, I often wonder how the minds of those who are seemingly supposed to be highly educated came up with Uber’s very latest innovation: “Share a ride and go home with a stranger”.


Fit and proper my a**e! 69


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