I have also had brought to my attention that there is a similar situation where Black Taxi drivers pay an additional license to Network Rail and only those get entry into Waverley Station.

A question to Mr. Taylor - is there any difference and what is the politics re this situation?

The Basa

re the saga of Edinburgh Airport Taxis -

The situation is not quite as clear cut as Mr Taylor suggests and, as a retired police officer, I think he’s being unduly harsh on the police. Edinburgh Airport is not a public road within the City of Edinburgh, where licensed taxis can ply for hire. From the Hilton Hotel roundabout, the roads are private; BAA, the airport operator, is the ‘roads authority’and make the rules and reg’s. The only ‘taxis’ allowed to pick up on ’spot hire’ are those private hires licensed by the Airport - who pay BAA handsomely for the privilige! Naturally, they get a bit aggrieved when black cabs, who pay nothing additional, cherry-pick fares. There’s nothing to stop a black cab picking up a pre-booked fare at the airport, following a phonecall to one of their dispatch offices - it might well be a black cab who’s just dropped off!

The poor police are caught in the middle, on a hiding to nothing - the Airport Taxi association is extremely militant and any cop failing to chase the black cabs at the behest of their Marshall could find himself subject to the full weight of a formal disciplinary investigation. BAA actually hire some of the police under Contract and so can, to quite some extent, direct their activities. The public can go to hell for the Airport Taxis, who keep the supply very tight. If anybody needs their heads banging together, it’s BAA and our mutual friends, the City of Embra Cooncil!

Would Mr Taylor like to clarify any personal interest in the matter - and might there also be a connecxtion with the story in Today’s ‘Evening News’ http://www.scotsman.com/?id=1824722005 ?

Do what I do and walk around a bit, hail a black cab that is leaving. He will almost always stop for you and if you are stopped by airport nazis simply call taxi driver by his name (your best mate) and thank him for waiting on you coming out. Tell nazi to piss off and go on your way.

The Restrictive Practice or Airport designed “taxi� service that Jim Taylor eludes to have a more sinister side to its operation.

The service or lack of is purposely designed to turn the customer into a commodity to be sold on for commercial profit. The restricting of taxi numbers artificially creates a scarcity value and an inflated financial premium for permits to pick up at the Airport. The customer is then forced to queue with the demand for taxis remaining unmet. BAA then charges the taxi operator for a permit to pick up while guaranteeing him a queue of disgruntled passengers who are waiting unwittingly for a taxi.

In short, the queuing system is designed to slow down or restrict service to the customer. No queue, No sale, No permit premium, No restrictive practice.

The security risk is all too evident and I do not believe that Edinburgh Council and BAA while being aided and abetted by Lothian and Borders finest are not well aware of the target they are creating in the operation of this system.

Garry Thomson

The same system applies to the Waverly and Haymarket stations.

The politics behind the situation is simple, financial gain for the companies running the show and kickbacks for the Councillors.

The same applies to the Taxi trade the licence plates are being traded for between £40,000-£50,000 each. This equates to the scarcity value of the plate and the customer waiting for a Taxi.

Myself and a number of my colleagues have applied for licence plates but Edinburgh council are denying us the opportunity to run our own businesses.

We might have to force them down the route of Judicial Revue.

We are looking for assistance in this matter, if there is anything you can do for us I am all ears.

The police officers working at Edinburgh airport are funded by the airport, their wages, vehicles etc etc do not come from the public purse.

As for protecting taxi ranks! Have a word!

Basa

yes, Network Rail make a charge for taxis to pick up in Waverley Station. And a smaller charge for Haymarket Station. The difference though, unlike the Airport is that if there are no permitted taxis waiting taxis setting down there may pick up from the assembled queue. At least this puts the needs of the passengers first and foremost.

The Airport is different because they have deliberately moved the taxi rank to a secure area away from the main drag where taxis setting down may pick up. This means that any assembled queue will have to stick it out while black taxis can be seen leaving the airport empty. The Airport’s desperate ploy to squeeze the last possible buck from each passenger is more important than meeting their needs, and ensuring their safety.

Of course, none of this would be possible without the Airport’s cosy relationship with Lothian and Borders constabulary. A posting to the Airport long viewed as a cosy number, the policemen in the team are clearly under the direct influence of Airport management as they do their bidding.

The road which circles the Airport is a public road, one where all the panoply of public offences of parking, speeding etc can be punished by Road Traffic legislation regulation. The rules about taxis picking up are local bye-laws and commercial matters which are pursuable by private prosecution. So, we have a publicly funded police force enforcing private regulations. This explains why there has been no successful prosecutions against those taxi drivers who pick up there.

But, why should we be surprised about restrictive practices here. Our council has riddled the taxi trade with such practices, all designed so that they can control it. They believe that they employ taxi drivers. They’ve tried to tell us what to wear. They have forced operators to sell perfectly legal vehicles on the premise that European Legislation had rendered them unfit for use. Edinburgh binned Fairway taxis. But they’re still being used everywhere else in the country. City of Edinburgh Council lied. And they scheme. And they depended on the weakness of trade representation to push the measure through.

We’re restricted in the vehicles we can use. While our competitors, private hire, can use more cost effective vehicles and bring down costs to our customers.

The council restricts the number of taxi plates issued so that, while private hire increase by 15 - 25 each month, we are stuck. We are forced to conduct a speacial survey of use to establish demand for taxis. By the time the document is published, private hire has already increased to soak up any increase in demand. The latest consultation is about to be published and the draft document states that there will be no need to increase taxi numbers. So why is private hire increasing so rapidly if there is no unmet demand for taxis?

I have no doubt this latest consultation is a sham. The word is that the council fixed the report to make sure that those recently applying for licences would be refused on the basis that there is no significant unmet demand (private hire is still increasing?). But what could be the reason for this sham?

The council sits cosily with the trade mandarins who, while pretending to represent the trade, have a vested interest in ensuring a scarcity value of taxi licence plates. The current price is £40,000 and rising. The market makers have been spectacularly successful in ensuring a long continuos hike in “values” despite market conditions which should have heralded a fall. This is only usually achieved by corrupt practices. City of edinburgh Council, who cares not a jot about customer needs where it impinges on their own lust for power and control, must surely be aiding and abetting this.

The trade mandarins, who wiev the excessive “value” of licence plates as their pension, are the only ones who really beneift.

The average joe, who wants to enter the trade and graft away, providing a service to a public who is sick fed up hanging around for scarces taxis, is hamstrung. he either doesn’t bother - remaining cannon fodder for the trade mandarins who leech off his effort - or he is saddled with a 70 grand taxi and plate debt he has to work off before he begins to build the real wealth his hard graft deserves. Meanwhile the public have to pay considerably higher fares than they should to finance all of this nonsense.

The problem with the taxi trade in Edinburgh, Scotland, and even the UK is that its control system was designed in the restrictive practices of 1970’s Britain. It needs to change. It needs to be modernised.

Free thinking. A free market. Work hard, meet customers real needs and earn just reward. All that’s stopping this is City of Edinburgh Council - Fascism in action.

Jim Taylor

Ross, you’re just plain wrong. As officers of Lothian and Borders police they are directly funded by taxpayers. Those working in our stations belong to British Transport police and are again funded by British/Scottish taxpayers, though not directly from the local public purse.

You may be confusing Airport police funding with the airport being charged a fee for the police services they consume, just as football clubs and other organisations are. But there is no direct correlation between this charge and the true cost of providing these officers. The charge levied on the Airport does not take in account the economic cost of recruiting, training, National Insurance, holiday provision, statutory sick pay, pension entitlement etc.

These officers are supposed to be under the direct control of our Chief Constable, not Airport management. It should be the Chief Constable, responsible to the Local Police Board and, ultimately, local taxpayers who should be setting the agenda for his officers.

So, is it the Chief Constable who is responsible for directing his officers, apparently “tooled” up to respond timeously to a security emergency, to chase down a black taxi driver, evict the passengers and instructing them to go the concealed taxi rank, and then threaten the taxi driver about the consquences if he doesn’t obey their command?

So, is it the Chief Constable who is responsible for this fascism in action? Is this what our police force has become?

I don’t believe it. I remain convinced that these policies are dreived over a cosy cup of tea in the Airport, all pals together. And that the council knows what is happening and is unwilling, or unable, to address either this matter, or the question of taxi access to the Airport which they are directly responsible for screwing up in the first place.

(Remember when the council forced all Airport taxis to convert to Hackney taxi licences, which were then sold off at great profit for airport taxi operators - £20,000 + - and then re-converted back to private hire wqhich operated outwith the full taxi regulation. Another council foul up or what?)

The only failure of our Chief Constable is that he has failed to deal with this situation, preferring to compund the harrassment of black taxi drivers by pursuing many failed prosecutions against them.

And then I remember Lothian and Borders police going to press to encourage a co-operation between the police and the black taxi trade - a partnership where the trade would be “the eyes and ears” of the police in the community interest. Nice idea, but no chance until Lothian & Borders finest gets its act together and begins to behave like the impartial force it is publicly charged to be.

First I have heard we are charged to pick up passengers at the waverly or haymarket and I worked it for many years,Is it not the case that cabs apply for a permit to “rank” in the stations. In the busy periods any taxi can pick up in either stations.

First I have heard we are charged to pick up passengers at the waverly or haymarket and I worked it for many years,Is it not the case that cabs apply for a permit to “rank” in the stations. In the busy periods any taxi can pick up in either station at no cost.

I would like to add that there is a paper ‘Myth and Reality’ in Microsoft Word format that is available from http://www.taxi-driver.co.uk/reality.doc . The following is taken from: http://www.taxi-driver.co.uk/reality.htm

BACKGROUND

In November 2003 the Office of Fair Trading recommended that any restrictions on the number of taxis operating should be lifted. Such controls are currently operated by almost half of UK local authorities.

Myth and Reality takes a critical look at the issue, and highlights several matters not included in the OFT’s report, and also includes an extensive critique of the arguments put forward by opponents of change, which we characterise as specious, superficial and scare mongering.

CHAPTER SUMMARY

Chapter 1 describes quantity controls on taxis as ’statutory cartels’ and concludes that a not inappropriate description of the economic consequences could be ‘tantamount to institutional theft’.

Chapter 2 outlines the superficial approach to measuring the number of taxis operating, and how restricting numbers packs an increasing number of drivers into a static number of vehicles to the benefit of vehicle license (plate) holders, and also results in burgeoning private hire vehicle numbers.

Chapter 3 shows how plates issued by local authorities for next to nothing can attain values of tens of thousands of pounds because of the closed market. The total worth of these plates can reach tens of millions of pounds in locations like Glasgow and Manchester, and the total UK worth is probably well in excess of a quarter of a billion pounds.

Also highlighted is the exploitative, discriminatory and anti-democratic nature of these policies in relation to excluded drivers, who usually constitute a majority of the local taxi trade.

Other effects are also examined, such as the illegal taxis in Scotland operating under a facade of licensed legitimacy, and how many Scottish local authorities have gotten round the legislation that did not allow for plate sales, and the underhand and perhaps illegal manner in which they have done this.

Chapter 4 outlines the deficiencies of the limitations placed on these cartels, and how these limitations have grossly distorted the number of taxis operating in local markets. We also point out how these limitations can be manipulated by the cartels to maintain the status quo, and how the cost of the chronically bureaucratic process can be borne by the tax payer.

Chapter 5 provide an extensive critique of the arguments used to justify these cartels, including false claims that lifting numerical controls on taxis would lead to sex offenders and drug dealers entering the trade, not to mention grossly misleading and specious statistics used to scare monger on taxi numbers.

Also highlighted are the self-serving and hypocritical arguments made by representative groups like the Transport and General Workers’ Union.

Chapter 6 concludes that restricting taxi numbers is neither socially just nor economically efficient.

An annexe provides some comment on the House of Commons Transport Committee’s report on the OFT’s recommendations.

The paper can be downloaded from:

http://www.taxi-driver.co.uk/reality.doc

(Word format, 310kb)

Given that Lothian & Borders Police force clear up rate for crime in general is a lamentable 23%, I’d be interested in hearing from the Chief Constable why Police officers are involved at all in determining who should/shouldnot be able hail a cab or pick up passengers.

Surely this should be the responsibility of Edinburgh Airport as these various ‘disputes’ arise on their property.

As regards who should be entitled to pick up passengers, the black cabs go mad if a private hire cab picks up on the street in town, yet apparently want to do the same kind of thing at the Airport. They can’t have it both ways.

Don,t worry, just be patient. All will change at the airport January 1. Blak cabs will get a rank to legally pick up and the existing private hire business will be decimated ( with a loss of jobs for the existing airport p h c owners and drivers). I say be patient, you will need to be as the queues will treble in the rush hour, Friday evenings, Festival ,Rugby internationals, etc. etc. Black Taxis will just not cope.

I have never understood why Private Hire Cars are able to charge their passengers the same tariff as Hackney Carriages. Hackney drivers must do “the knowledge” and as such should be trusted to provide a more cost effective route. As I understand it, they are subject to tighter controls by the cab office also.

I agree with Marco that black cabs will not be able to provide the cover required at the airport, however is the answer not to ensure that more black cabs are on the road, than to rely on kiddy on taxi drivers who need a map to find their way from hanover street to the mound?

With regard to the stushie over taxi provision at Edinburgh Airport…..

Since taking out an annual pass with Lothian Buses, I now use the excellent No100 Airline service (which having a pass, of course, costs me nothing). The service is very frequent, takes you to the city centre in almost as quick a time as a taxi, and even with large items of luggage is very convenient. Also, the bus driver does not expect a tip!

Edinburgh’s over-priced taxis are now an irrelevance to me as far as the airport run is concerned.

The one route bus is not always convenient J. smith, indeed, not everyone likes to be transported by the state, and just on your last point, we don’t expect a tip either,but then when did u last see a bus driver opening a door for you or lifting your cases on to the trolley , if you pay 3 quid then you get 3 quids worth of service, just another wee question, did the bus come to your door, electronicly inform you of its arrival and then lift your bags into the vehicle then look after you personally and ensured your safety all the way to the airport, or did it , after your walk or other journey to the bus stance just take your money and treat you as if you didnt exist, when you got to the airport , did the driver jump out and help you with your luggage? Its a big debate in Edinburgh and beyond just now, but, if you pay cattle fares then you get treated like cattle, A REAL CAB TO THE AIRPORT FOR ME ANYTIME.

Just to play devil’s advocate - I get taxi’s a lot to airports around the world including Edinburgh Airport. Taxi drivers will not always help with your luggage including drivers taking me to EDI.

Pretty much anyone with luggage would probably take a taxi to the bus anyway. The good things about the taxi is they take you from your door whether or not the driver helps you with your luggage.

Bemused but not alone?

Edinburgh Council is about to claim, watching this space “no unmet demand for taxi services� in the city. (JACOBS REPORT Evening News 05/09/05) Makes you wonder why they initiated the report on the bases of the huge increase in Private Hire Cars “may be indicative of a latent unmet demand for taxi services�. Their words not mine (Taxi Monitors Report May/June 2004)

Ooooops nearly forgot the Airport is opening up to the Edinburgh Taxi Fleet at the end of this year.

I don’t suppose this will cause an unmet demand either?

The CEC pays £28,000 to commission a survey in June/July of this year and forgets why they commissioned the survey in the first place.

You couldn’t make this stuff up?

To my detractor. It’s all a question of VALUE FOR MONEY. Yes, basically a taxi will ALWAYS be the much better option (grumpy drivers excepted) but the bus/taxi experience has to be examined in the light of the relevant outlays. I reckon that the cost of a taxi from the city centre to the airport and back again would be circa £30 while the return bus fare costs a fiver (nothing if you already have a pass). Also, on wet days it is probably quicker to catch a bus than hail a taxi in this city!

Well, If it comes down to just money then I suppose you have a point, but like I have said before, not everyone likes to be transported by the state, some crave that individuality and also, to be honest, on a wet day I’d rather be looking for a cab than a bus, In Edinburgh, You have a cab service second to none, As a sometime bus user,We can’t in all honesty say the same about them, cheap maybe, service, well,It has it’s moments, and as for that bus tracker thing, pitiful can be the only way to describe it,on the cabs, sat nav is near perfect and a very knowledgeable driver too, and you can speak to him too, or not as you wish, you dont have to sit in the corner worrying if someone might mug you when you get out, indeed you can leave your valuables on the seat as you travel without worry of being mugged, nah, am sorry, the cabs are for me, I dont have to even get out half journey to catch another form of transport just to get home, its door to door anytime, god bless you edinburgh cabbies.

Having now read most of the above i have come to the conclusion that there is an abundance of misinformed people
out there that need to get a grip on what is truth and what is fiction If you want to talk about a subject make sure you do your homework prior to it going into print because what i have read here cant even be described as good enough to read in the toilet .

Hi
Nice one mate! Keep up the good work…

Regards

Just to let all you so called well informed people know that since the introduction of your beloved black taxi rank at the airport there has been to many incidents to list here and knowing the bias of our local rag will never be put into print
so that the local yokels who have taken it upon themselves to cast many false statement of fact against what was the Airport Taxis either now or prior to the magical year 2000 when a slightly twisted local council decided to do away with the airport taxis system as it was then, in favour of the wonderful black taxis ( who didnt have european whole type approval or a crash test certificate ) hence the new red rule book for the wonderful purpose built lump of crap called a fairway.
Today 31.5.2006 letters went out to 80 individual BLACK TAXI DRIVERS from B A A banning them from using the new taxi
rank and this is just the tip of the iceberg never before has the B.A.A had to do this and i can only hope that you keep up sending back fares that are to short for you to take and constantly overcharge people who go west of the airport keep up thegood work this time 2007 yill nae be there

Why do people talk about things that they know nothing about????
Just to inform whoever the private hire cars at Edinburgh aiprport also have tio sit the knowledge test, and all drivers at the aiport have passed and do have their brief just exactly the same as hackneys.

so there hope that puts you right