Sir, - We live in a regulated society for better or for worse. Regulated industries include the bar trade, chemists, post offices, telecommunications and taxis, to mention the more common ones. Now the Faber Report proposes to deregulate the taxi market and tough luck if you happen to be a taxi operator who invested a lot of time and money in becoming one (my father spent 20 years).
Surely the function of government is not to pull the bottom out of a certain market. If more taxis are needed, then there is a moral obligation to ensure that people's assets are protected. One way of doing this would be to issue a second plate to each current plate holder. This gives the current holders the option of either liquidising part of their investment by selling one plate (for half of what the original was worth), or operating a second plate. It will also sort out the taxi problem in one year, as opposed to ten, as planned by the Faber Report. - Yours, etc., Terence O'Connell,
Tralee, Co Kerry.