Taxi Report Calls For Big Rise In Fares

The Age

Thursday June 5, 2008

Jason Dowling, City Editor

MELBOURNE would have hundreds more cabs and increased taxi fares under recommendations in a new draft report.

The report called for 330 more wheelchair-accessible taxis for Melbourne to ease long peak-hour delays for taxis, and for a new method of calculating price rises for fares that would likely mean bigger annual increases.

The report also called for increased monitoring of waiting times for Melbourne's 4500 taxis, with an automatic increase in taxi numbers should delays blow out.

The draft report on taxi fares by the Essential Services Commission, released yesterday, rejected recommending a one-off fare increase, with the Government set to announce increased fares in September on top of the 4.2% increase granted in April.

The commission instead recommended a new system for determining fare increases based on rises in taxi-specific running costs such as LPG, which has been increasing in price above inflation.

The report also called for objectives for new taxi regulations to include vehicle standards and customer service standards.

"Customer satisfaction surveys indicate that vehicle condition is an important source of dissatisfaction," the report noted.

Commission chairman Greg Wilson said waiting times were an important issue for the industry. He said there had been anecdotal evidence of people waiting hours for taxis during peak weekend periods in Melbourne.

The report called for a "performance monitoring report" to be developed and published every six months, which would include waiting times and customer satisfaction.

Mr Wilson said customer satisfaction with the performance of Melbourne's taxi industry had been declining.

The report also called for more transparency and the possible registration of driver contracts to increase the take-home pay of drivers.

"Taxi driver remuneration in Victoria is low relative to other states and related jobs in other industries, and reflects a highly inequitable distribution of income throughout the industry," the report said.

Taxi driver Thirupathi Peddi said drivers would not oppose an increase in taxi numbers as long as there was an increase in fares.

"If the number of taxis increases and the fares rise then the people are happy because you can get a taxi, and the drivers are happy because they can make some money," he said.