Shropshire Council backs down over taxi changes
Friday 17th June 2011, 4:48PM BST.
Shropshire licensing chiefs have backed down over a proposed shake-up of taxi zones in the county, which included the introduction of a single rate card, after a huge protest by drivers.
Officials at Shropshire Council today said they had abandoned plans to bring in a unified fare structure and overhaul licences of all Hackney carriages in the county.
The council had planned to repeal the by-laws on zoning and create one zone following a move to a unitary authority, with a single rate card proposed for the county.
But it has now decided to stick to the current five zones based on the old borough districts of Bridgnorth, north Shropshire, Oswestry, Shrewsbury and Atcham and south Shropshire.
Taxi drivers in Shrewsbury today celebrated the move and claimed it had prevented fares from rocketing by up to 300 per cent.
The move followed an angry protest involving about 100 taxi drivers on the streets of Shrewsbury in January in a show of unity against the de-zoning plans.
The drivers honked their horns and followed each other in a convoy of vehicles as they carried out a double loop of the town before arriving at the Shirehall.
Councillor Rosanna Taylor-Smith, chairman of the council’s strategic licensing committee, today said the authority had received hundreds of views during the consultation.
She said: “In response to extensive consultation, Shropshire’s taxi zones are to be retained for the present time.”
l Axed – See Page 25
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Who is running the county council our elected representatives or Taxi drivers? Lets all protest about an increase in council taxes and see if they then back down it seems pampering to a minority.
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To be fair it seems that Shropshire Council can NEVER be in the right. If it had decided – after consultation, to go ahead with its plans there would be comments that there was no point to the consultation as the council never listens. Now that the plans have been changed they are told they are caving in to the taxi drivers.
Maybe we should just follow the old Roman example and have a dictator who just does whatever they want and can ignore what anyone says?
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