At least 1,500 taxi drivers or their families are now set to take legal action against the State over the hardship caused by the regulation and subsequent deregulation of the industry.
The first cases are expected to come before the High Court within months.
Some of the cases are being taken by drivers who mortgaged their homes to spend about €100,000 on taxi licences before the industry was liberalised in November 2000.
The licences now cost €6,500, while wheelchair-accessible licences cost just €125.
Other cases are being taken by widows who had been depending on the rental of the taxi licences for a pension.
Mr Vinnie Kearns, vice president of the National Taxi Driver Union (NDTU), said the State had a clear case to answer, as drivers and their families had suffered extreme hardship because of the way the State had handled the regulation of the sector.
Widows had paid tax on their late husbands' taxi licences yet after deregulation, the State had made the very same licences worthless, he said.
"Before deregulation, the total value of taxi licences was €400 million, yet the Government has offered just €15 million by way of hardship payments," he said.
Up to Wednesday, 275 taxi drivers or their dependants had applied for these payments from the Taxi Hardship Panel. It was set up to alleviate "extreme personal financial hardship" caused directly by the deregulation of the taxi industry.
Payments from €3,000 to €15,000 will be made to taxi drivers or taxi licence holders who can show that they suffered hardship after their industry was liberalised.
There are six categories of applicants, including widows with no income, taxi drivers who had mortgaged their homes to buy licences before deregulation, and people with disabilities.
ADM, which is administering the scheme on behalf of the Minister for Transport, sent out more than 2,000 application forms to taxi licence holders who had made submissions when the Taxi Hardship Panel began assessing the situation.
A further 184 forms were sent out to people who requested them after details of the scheme were announced last month.
A spokeswoman for ADM said the small number of applicants was not surprising at this stage, as a substantial amount of information was required.
Applicants must be tax compliant and must include a tax-clearance certificate, evidence of earnings and medical documentation, where relevant.
Mr Kearns said the NDTU was fielding queries from drivers, "day in, day out". He predicted that, of the 3,900 drivers affected by deregulation, about 2,000 would apply to the scheme.
He described the payments as "derisory" and said it was disgraceful that the Government had ignored the recommendations made by the European Parliament's Petitions Committee.
The committee called for a total review of the issue. However, the Minister for Transport, Mr Brennan, said he could do no more for taxi drivers and their families.
The group FAIR, which represents drivers and families of former drivers, said it would continue to campaign for families.
