Taxi deregulation hasn’t been the smooth ride it was supposed to be

IF EVER there has been a telling story of the Celtic Tiger era it is how a mess was made of organising the provision of a sensible taxi service throughout the country.

A decade ago there were legitimate complaints about how difficult it was for people to access taxis when they wanted or needed them. There was a dramatic shortage of available vehicles in a highly regulated business, where the issue of licences was restricted to a number that was not capable of matching demand. It was not uncommon to queue for hours in the small hours of the morning in our major cities, such was the lack of available transport, and many rural areas had no taxis at all. Even during the day it could take an hour for an ordered taxi to arrive — if one came at all.

Those in possession of taxi licences were able to make lots of money and there were stories of licences changing hands for nearly €100,000 each. It wasn’t necessarily the drivers you met who benefited from that however. Often they rented the licence, and sometimes the car, from the owner, paying expensively for it. Some decided they had to buy, even at those prices, and borrowed heavily to buy a licence, even before spending on a car and all the associated running expenses.