SHAR­LENE RAM­PER­SAD

Works and Trans­port Min­is­ter Ro­han Sinanan says a Cab­i­net note to treat with the is­sues in the na­tion­al trans­porta­tion net­work was ex­pect­ed to be tak­en be­fore the Cab­i­net yes­ter­day.

Sinanan was ad­dress­ing mem­bers of the Na­tion­al Taxi Dri­vers Net­work at the Min­istry of Works and Trans­port build­ing in Port- of- Spain yes­ter­day morn­ing.

The taxi dri­vers held a brief protest, call­ing for Sinanan to meet with them say­ing they would not sup­port any leg­is­la­tion to le­galise PH taxis be­fore Sinanan came down to speak with them.

But Sinanan made it clear that the Cab­i­net note would not rec­om­mend the leg­is­la­tion of PH taxis but ways to move for­ward to solve the is­sues fac­ing taxi dri­vers and com­muters.

“We are not reg­u­lar­is­ing PH we are go­ing to find a mech­a­nism to have a le­gal process for every­body who wants to of­fer their ve­hi­cle for hire that there will be a le­gal frame­work for them to do it- it is not le­gal­is­ing PH, you can­not le­galise some­thing that is il­le­gal,” he said.

Sinanan said the note al­so ad­dressed rideshare ser­vices.

He said the taxi dri­vers will be the first stake­hold­ers con­sult­ed once Cab­i­net ap­proves the note.

“If it is ap­proved, then we go out for con­sul­ta­tion- I want to give the taxi body the as­sur­ance that they are the first group on the list for con­sul­ta­tion and we ex­pect that to hap­pen some­time next week be­cause it is some­thing that we have a time frame to im­ple­ment.”

Among the is­sues high­light­ed by the dri­vers was the long wait to re­new their taxi badges and the threat of be­ing vic­tims of crime.

Sinanan said Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Gary Grif­fith has agreed to meet with the dri­vers to ad­dress their con­cerns but said meet­ings had been de­layed be­cause of COVID-19 re­stric­tions.

“We must ac­cept the fact that the dri­vers are un­der some stress and pres­sure from some un­ruly ‘PH’ dri­vers, they do have some chal­lenges where they are be­ing over­pow­ered by some of the il­le­gal modes of trans­porta­tion,” he said.

He said the Cab­i­net note will treat with the en­tire pub­lic trans­porta­tion sys­tem with a holis­tic ap­proach.

“If you want to of­fer your ve­hi­cle for hire, you can­not dis­en­fran­chise the reg­u­lar taxi dri­vers, for who this is their liveli­hood so we can­not have one rule for PH, one rule for taxi dri­vers and the reg­u­lar taxi dri­vers are be­ing dis­en­fran­chised. Right now in Port of Spain, the PH can get in­to Port-of-Spain and the reg­u­lar taxis can­not, we can­not al­low a sys­tem like that to con­tin­ue.”

Sinanan said the pub­lic can al­so ex­pect to see an ed­u­ca­tion pro­gramme rolled out in the com­ing days to en­cour­age more cit­i­zens to be­come taxi dri­vers. He said that pro­gramme was on­ly ap­proved on Thurs­day morn­ing.

“We are go­ing to put out a pub­lic ed­u­ca­tion pro­gramme to en­cour­age more peo­ple to come in­to the le­git­i­mate taxi ser­vice, you all will that rolling out with­in the next cou­ple of days- the idea is to get every­one with­in a le­gal frame­work so we are go­ing to show how easy it is to be­come a bonafide taxi dri­ver, you will see that hap­pen­ing with­in the next few days.”