People in rural Ireland saw their Christmas socialising and shopping seriously curtailed because a lack of viable taxi and hackney options, Senator Garret Ahearn has said.
The Clonmel, Co Tipperary based Fine Gael senator has called on Minister for Transport Eamon Ryan to push to deregulate transport so services like Uber can operate more easily in more of the country.
Senator Ahearn said “a choice of transport is something most people in rural Ireland can only dream about”.
“This Christmas, we’ve seen once again in areas like my own of Clonmel and in towns and villages right around the country, the curtailment of people’s socialising and shopping through to a lack of decent transport,” he said.
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The Senator said rural Ireland was experiencing a significant shortage of taxi services in towns. “That has been evident particularly throughout this busy season. It’s high time we saw some intent from the Minister for Transport to address the problem,” he said.
Uber, which has been in Ireland since 2014, is still only licensed to operate in cities and is subject to the same regulations as other small public service vehicles (SPSV) operators, which limits its functionality compared to other jurisdictions where drivers without taxi licences can take fares.
Senator Ahern said this needs to be expanded with the National Transport Authority’s (NTA) “resistance” to services like Uber addressed by the Minister for Transport.
Otherwise the Senator said “people living in rural Ireland will continue to suffer”.
He added that Mr Ryan “should be doing more to ensure a quicker roll out of taxis and hackneys in areas outside the main urban cities”.
At the beginning of this year, Mr Ryan launched the 2023 local hackney pilot scheme, a one-year grant-aided pilot programme that aims to assist in providing part-time local hackney services in designated rural areas that cannot support a full-time taxi or hackney operation.
“But this pilot is currently only servicing 21 locations nationwide and even at that, local hackneys may only pick up passengers within a designated area of between 7-10km from a chosen point” Senator Ahearn said.
“Those living in our cities and big urban centres are afforded choice when it comes to transport. There’s public transport and various taxi options. A choice of transport is something most people in rural Ireland can only dream about – they need a safe, reliable mode of transport that can take them where they need to go, be it to meet friends, attend an appointment or do shopping.
“For too long Minister Ryan has passed the buck to the NTA, leaving the ball entirely in their court to veto who drives our taxis, from where and when.”
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