Taxi drivers to withdraw services for 24 hours next month

TAXI DRIVERS who staged a protest in Dublin yesterday said they will demonstrate again by withdrawing their services for 24 hours next month.

About 400 drivers took part in a protest organised by the Taxi Drivers for Change organisation at about lunchtime yesterday. About 25 members of Siptu demonstrated at Dublin airport yesterday morning.

The larger protest set off in two convoys from Airside retail park in Swords and the Liffey Valley shopping centre in Clondalkin at 9am, reaching the Commission for Taxi Regulation in Fitzwilliam Square by noon.

A number of members of the advisory council to the Commission for Taxi Regulation, who were meeting regulator Kathleen Doyle at the offices, were heckled as they left at about 1pm.

The Siptu drivers staged their protests at Dublin airport between 7am and 11am.

Both groups were protesting at what they say is an oversupply of taxis since deregulation of the industry. They are calling for a halt to the issuing of licences.

Frank Byrne, one of the organisers of the Taxi Drivers for Change protest, said this was their seventh protest and there had been no change in the regulator’s policy of issuing licences, nor fromMinister for Transport Noel Dempsey.

“We’re not going away. We are going to have a total stop on April 1st, from noon, until noon on April 2nd. We’re stopping and if one day is not enough we will have to stop for longer,” he told drivers gathered at Fitzwilliam Square.

He called on members of other drivers’ unions and organisations to join in their stoppage and implored all taxi drivers to “stick together”.

Many of those who took part in the protest displayed in their taxis posters supporting the Irish Cancer Society’s Daffodil Day, which fell yesterday.

They also collected donations for the charity, following calls to radio programmes on Thursday for them to postpone their protest as it might distract from Daffodil Day.

Mr Byrne said numbers taking part in yesterday’s protest were lower than in previous ones because the organisers had “put the word out that anyone who felt uncomfortable with demonstrating the same day as Daffodil Day could decide not to take part.”

At the airport about 15 drivers staged a protest at the roundabout at the airport entrance, carrying placards. There was no adverse impact on passengers, a spokeswoman for the airport said.

Gerry Brennan, organiser of the Siptu taxi branch, said the protest “went well” and further actions at different locations would be announced “in coming days”.

Asked whether he would support his members taking part in a work stoppage on April 1st, he said he supported the right of any driver to withdraw his or her services, or to protest “as long as it’s done legally”. He said Siptu had begun its protests about the state of the industry “before the lads in Taxi Drivers for Change” and the union would pursue its campaign.