"QUITE SATISFIED"

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 74, 24 September 1936, Page 17

"QUITE SATISFIED"

HUTT TAXI OWNERS

LONG HOURS IN CITY

The wishes of operators in the Hutt Valley were placed before the committee which is inquiring into the taxi business in Wellington when the hearing was resumed yesterday afternoon.

The committee consists of Messrs. P. M. Butler (chairman), J. Walker, and H. B. Smith.

On resumption, the chairman said that the committee intended sitting at S a.m. on Friday for the benefit of the night drivers.

William T. J. Morrison, representing the Hutt and Petone Taxi Association, in a statement, said that operators in the Hutt Valley were quite satisfied with the present position, and they considered that wages should not be forced upon them. The men employed on commission were earning good money, and were giving a satis-j factory service to the public. If wages were fixed the men would not show the same interest in the work, and consequently would not give the same service to the public. If the men could not earn £4 10s a week, plus tips, then they should not be driving. The operators in the Hutt Valley desired that all taxis pjying for hire should be compelled to have meters, that the fare in Lower Hutt and Petone be fixed at Is per mile for under three passengers, and that the number of licences should be restricted in the Hutt Valley. It was also desired that the fares should be fixed for funerals, weddings, and drives, and that insurance rates be adjusted. 100 HOURS A WEEK. Vernet Mitchell, a commission driver in the Grey Cabs, said that his company had some cars with two drivers, working week about on day and night, shifts. The day-shift man worked about 10 hours a day and the nightshift man from. 12 to 15 hours, Over a fortnightly period the average wage was about £3 a week. Single-shift drivers were given a free hand in regard to hours, and owing to the small amount of work available some of the men, particularly the married ones, worked 100 hours a week. There were men doing other work who owned cars and employed drivers on commission to run them. Some of these men had been in the taxi business and realised it was more profitable for them to take outside jobs than to drive the cars themselves. Consequently, they had1 two sources of income. He did not think it was fair that a driver working on commission should buy the car for the owner.

To enable wages to be paid to drivers under existing conditions it would be necessary to increase the fares. Conditions must be improved for the owner-drivers before there could be any general improvement, and amalgamation was the only solution to the problem. It was maintained that by charging a high levy the companies benefited at the expense of the owner-driver. In Auckland, where the cabs were more or less under a central concern, the levy paid by the ownerdriver was about half of that paid by the man in Wellington.