For­mer min­is­ter of works and trans­port Ro­han Sinanan says the con­cerns raised by maxi taxi op­er­a­tors are not friv­o­lous, al­though he would not light­ly sup­port in­dus­tri­al ac­tion that leaves com­muters strand­ed.

Re­spond­ing to the on­go­ing strike by maxi taxi op­er­a­tors yes­ter­day, Sinanan said the is­sues be­ing raised in­clude the reg­u­la­tion of PH ve­hi­cles, ac­cess arrange­ments, safe­ty and se­cu­ri­ty, op­er­at­ing costs, ter­mi­nal con­di­tions, pay­ments for school trans­port ser­vices, and the im­ple­men­ta­tion of com­mit­ments made dur­ing meet­ings.

“A lot of work had been done on these mat­ters. Some were in train and oth­ers at the point of im­ple­men­ta­tion,” he said.

Sinanan said the sit­u­a­tion sug­gests there has been a break­down in com­mu­ni­ca­tion, shared goals and ac­tive im­ple­men­ta­tion.

“In my view, the fact that the mat­ter has reached this point sug­gests a break­down in com­mu­ni­ca­tion, shared goals, and ac­tive im­ple­men­ta­tion,” he said.

Draw­ing on his ex­pe­ri­ence work­ing with maxi taxi as­so­ci­a­tions, Sinanan said they are not stake­hold­ers who ide­al­ly want to reach the stage of with­hold­ing ser­vice.

“I would not light­ly sup­port any ac­tion that leaves com­muters strand­ed or caus­es hard­ship to the pub­lic. How­ev­er, from what has been re­port­ed, the is­sues raised by the maxi taxi op­er­a­tors are not friv­o­lous,” he added.