Dundee.

Tay Taxis director says some city cabbies are 'too lazy' to help people into cars

A Dundee taxi firm director says the trade in Dundee is need of a radical "shake-up" — as he accused some drivers of being "too lazy to get off their backside to help people into cars."

George Harris, director of Tay Taxis, went on to compare the appearance of some drivers to that of Worzel Gummidge before warning that the service was now so poor that the city had fallen five years behind other regions.

The former chairman of Dundee Taxi Association — has been with independent taxi operator Tay Taxis for over a decade — made his comments in response to a row over proposals tabled by the city council licensing committee in March to make all cabs wheelchair-accessible vehicles (WAVs).

Mr Harris opposes the move and believes there are more pressing issues before the matter of WAVs should be considered.

"Every car has got its own reason and there is no one vehicle that suits everyone," he told The Courier. "For those who are not in wheelchairs but still infirm it's very difficult for them to get their way into these larger wheelchair cars, so what about their needs?

"There is a lot of personal politics at play here, and at the moment this is what the taxi drivers — sitting with their flasks — are all talking about on the taxi ranks."

Dundee has no cap in place to limit the number of taxis. It has been said that by allowing only WAVs to operate in the city this, in effect, will reduce the number of cabs on roads.

Mr Harris, who has 48 vehicles with Tay Taxis, believes there is already a suitable amount of disabled access taxis. But he argues that a major problem lies with "lazy" drivers who would rather take on quick fares than spend time helping disabled passengers in and out of cars.

"Some drivers — not all — don't want to pick up wheelchair fares because it takes 45-60 minutes out of their day," he said.

"At our firm we have 18 taxis set aside with guys who we know can be called upon for disabled fares. But that is the last thing a lot of other drivers want to do."

He continued, "The majority of our customers prefer not to have the wheelchair-type cars. We have a load of requests from people when they call up not to send this sort of vehicle."

Meanwhile the current chairman of the Dundee Taxi Association (DTA) Graeme Stephen believes the council has "lost control" of the local trade because of the amount of cabs in the city.

Dress code

He also hit out at the standard of service on offer before calling on taxi regulators to take more action when policing drivers to ensure their code of conduct is adhered to.

"There is a dress code which many drivers just don't bother about," he said. "Cab officers are never out checking this and they really should be."

John Alexander, who has driven a London-style cab over many years, believes there is a problem with the service on offer to passengers, but not because of what drivers wear.

"You have good and bad taxi drivers, like everywhere else," he said. "But what is really hurting cabbies is the number of new taxis flooding into Dundee every month.

"I have to work 14, 15-hour days just to try and make a living because there are too many."

Fellow cabbie Billy Cassidy wants to see wheelchair-access vehicles become a compulsory measure and says the style of vehicle offers protection to the driver from aggressive or drunk customers.

"Look at buses and trains — the driver is shielded from their passengers," he said. "If you look at saloon cars that is not the case.

"What is stopping someone grabbing the steering wheel and driving you on to the pavement? Whereas in a cab you do have protection, so there is an important safety issue here," he said.
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London

The daughter of shamed former cabinet minister Chris Huhne headbutted a taxi driver who tried to sexually assault her after a night out.

Lydia Huhne fought back when she was attacked by the cabbie who locked the car doors, climbed into the back and touched her face and breast.

Miss Huhne, who co-runs a theatre company, said: ‘I just saw red and headbutted him in the middle of the face. He sort of recoiled and then I yelled he better let me out of the car because I had a Stanley knife and would be forced to use it.

‘He started to laugh and opened the doors and I just ran out. If it wasn’t for me having done fight scenes I wouldn’t have ever thought about headbutting.’

The 24-year-old, whose parents, former energy secretary Mr Huhne and his ex-wife Vicky Pryce, were jailed over a speeding points scam, has said she wants a positive message to come out of her ‘horrible experience’ which left her ‘retching with shock’.

Miss Huhne said she climbed into an unlicensed car which a club bouncer had hailed for her after a friend’s birthday party.

But she added: ‘However close you are to home, however safe you feel, you must never get in those cars.

‘They are just touters. I feel quite lucky that nothing really serious happened, I’m pretty shaken up by the whole event.’


The driver was described as a stocky Afro-Caribbean. Scotland Yard is investigating the incident, which happened in Clapham, south London, in the early hours of Sunday morning.