11:10am Thursday 7th September 2006
TAXI drivers in Winchester say they are being forced to work dangerously long hours to try to make ends meet, because the competition for fares is so intense.
There are around 400 Hackney and private hire cabs in the Winchester district, and only a handful of places for them to park, including spaces near the station, on The Broadway, and behind Sainsbury's.
Steve Eckton has driven taxis in Winchester since 1994, and is now the chairman of the Winchester Taxi and Private Hire Association.
The 44-year-old from Sparsholt said that almost two years ago a group of taxi drivers wrote to the city council and asked it to suspend issuing Hackney licences, but was told because of unmet demand, it was unable to do so.
He would like the city council to do more research into the number of taxis operating in the district.
"We are sitting around all day," he said.
"Some of the drivers are sat on the rank sometimes for an hour or two just for a £2.50 or £3 fare, and then they've got to get back on the rank and wait another long time before picking up anyone else."
He said that taxis had been used in the hot weather, but generally only on short trips, and said drivers were doing well if they made £30 per day. He said all drivers should be making at least double that, but with the amount of competition there was no chance of making that kind of money in an eight-hour shift.
"Some of the drivers come out at 7am or 8am and don't get back at home until 2am or 4am the next day," he said.
Mr Eckton added it wasn't uncommon for drivers to work more than 80 hours a week, and said some were even working 24 hours a day during the Homelands music festival.
One driver said the number of taxis had a knock-on effect with the volume of traffic on the city's roads, and said the ranks were often full so he had to drive around the city waiting for a vacant spot.
Another long-serving driver, added: "We can't use the bus lanes so we have to sit in traffic, add to the queues, and use up our own petrol."
Mohammad Jan, a taxi driver from Southampton, who plies his trade in Winchester, said: "It's true. We are working more hours just to survive."
A city council spokesman said there was not a limit on how many taxis there are, or could be in Winchester.
She said: "If we can prove that there's unmet demand then you can limit the number, but it's very difficult to gauge.
"To do that we would have to get outside consultants in at a cost of between £20,000 and £30,000 of taxpayers' money to conduct a survey to see if there is unmet demand, and there are no plans to do one."
The spokesman added that around six people apply to become taxi drivers each month and the pass rate is around 50 per cent.
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