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The Minister for Public Transport Alan Kelly and the former Garda Commissioner Pat Byrne announce the establishment of a major taxi review group Eamonn Farrell/Photocall Ireland
Taxis
Review of the taxi industry begins
The Public Transport Minister has established a taxi review group to tackle problems in the industry. He wants to reduce the number of taxis on the roads and to halt criminal activity.
THE PUBLIC TRANSPORT Minister Alan Kelly is to carry out out a review of the taxi industry. Kelly says the review is designed to “clean up” some unsavoury practices which have developed following deregulation.
A reduction in the number of taxis, monitoring insurance policies and tax evasion, tackling cloned taxi plates and securing criminal convictions for those who don’t have a licence are some of the outcomes the minister wants to achieve. Kelly says he wants to “take the criminals out of the industry”.
He says that he wants to investigate the possibility of limiting the number of licences issued.
Former Garda Commissioner Pat Byrne will join Minister Kelly in chairing the taxi sector review group.
Outcry followed the airing of a Prime Time Investigates programme which exposed double-jobbing in the taxi industry, fighting at ranks, unsafe cars and bribes paid to NCT testers, and Minister Kelly announced at the time that a review would get underway.
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