Around 300 Fixed Penalties had been issued for Addison Lee vehicles driving in the M4 bus lane since November 2009.
You can either pay the ticket, appeal and go to the adjudicators or contest the fine in Court. By paying the fine you are assumed to admit liability. So by paying many of the tickets Griffin has already admitted they were breaking the law.
Addison Lee were due to have their appeal against some of the fines, but not all, on 6/7 September 2010.
The Crown Prosecution Service needed more time to prepare its case, but the Court refused to allow this. So the penalties concerned were effectively cancelled. However there are more appeals due to be heard and the CPS plan to go ahead with these. But as of yet, we don't know when.
It therefore doesn't mean that Addison Lee have won, the case will go on. This also doesn't mean that Addi Lee's drivers can start driving in all bus lanes in Central London, if they do, we have been assured that PCNs will be issued.
There are some very serious issues here,The first being,Why did the CPS,need more time to prepare the case,Surely its cut and dry,the were in the buslane and its illegal,How many other people are getting away with crimes simply because the CPS,need more time,Because need more time is really another way of saying we could not be bothered to do it,Secondly how many times have we read on here ADDI/LEE drivers saying its not a problem for them as they just take the ticket back and GRIFFIN pays it,Sorry you mugs not according to this,But i suppose he will tell you,He has won,and you idiots will believe him,Tell me whose name goes on the ticket,yours or his,Because if its yours,well your the one thats liable,See wake up guys if he really believed he was going to win,Why has he not told you to use all buslanes,In the last 2 days i personally have seen 2 ADDI/LEE,minicabs pulled over and nicked for being in the buslane,Hopefully the police have seen you were just taking the piss out of them,And they dont lie that,so i reckon a lot more of you will be nicked in the coming weeks,Still dont worry as GRIFFIN will pay your fines or will he ?????,
ReplyDeletethis company are behaving as if they have more power than the licencing authority
ReplyDeleteeventually they are going to be an item discussed at a higher level and this will cost them
Well we know the Addison Lee Drivers come on here as well as the sweat shop owners.
ReplyDeleteWise up and organise yourselves against exploitation!
We in the Licensed Taxi trade have no issues with those who obey the law.
Stay out the bus lanes, do not tout or 'hang up' because your boss keeps recruiting drivers for work you ain't got.
Surely you can see who the problem is here.
Everybody on here is quick to blame GRIFFIN and i dont know why,after all he is a buisnessman,All he done was realised there was no cameras on this stretch of Buslane and exploited it,Knowing full well our so called bosses at the PCO dont have the bottle to act,On which he was proved right,Now the M4 buslane is a pretty dangerous place to be,as it is used by everyone,not just ADDI/LEE, could you imagine him pulling half the stunts he does if we had still been under the MET, he would have lost his license ages ago,and they would have made bloody dam sure nobody remotely involved with him was issued it,Maybe its about time we forced that enquiry into the TPH or whatever its called,I have been told its already known on the "Knowledge" as "the theatre of fools.
ReplyDeleteThe police and the CPS can get a murder case to trial in a few months when they want to, driving in a bus lane is a simple, non endorsable, fixed penalty offence - like a £60 parking ticket.
ReplyDeleteThe reason its taking so long is the authorities know there is no real justification to deny Addison Lee (and mini cabs generally) access to the M4 bus lane and the authorities will be on an embarrasing hiding for nothing if they lose. This will have the knock on to, quite rightly, end the taxi/mini cab discrimination and open the M4 - and eventually ALL bus lanes to all taxi/mini-cabs.
Some may say the delay also shows that no-one is really is too bothered about this - except black taxi drivers so lets get real, it don't make any difference to a big red bus bus if a black taxi or a black mini cab is in front of them, and and as for the M4 bus lane being 'pretty dangerous' - are you sure, its half empty for 16 hours a day and who can claim that the average taxi driver is a better driver than an average mini cab driver - I think not . . . just find me a London car driver/biker/cyclist who's never had a black taxi pull out in front of him - and I'll give him the fare to get him a cab (mini or taxi) to south London . . .
Interested Party - Kent
Interested party, stick to Kent.
ReplyDeletescabs are driving shit carts on foreign driving licenses, some who come from the sub continent have never taken a test. Im told in India you buy a license over the post office counter!
They are allowed to work in London for up to six months before they have to take a test (or pay someone to take the test for them).
They are not allowed in a bus lane simply because they are not a metered service like Taxi's and have no time restraint on their journeys.
You will never be allowed in Bus lanes so, Get over it.
140 rapes by these drivers every year just in London; sat-navs that don't work in built up areas., drivers who cant find Victoria Station and you compare them to the best taxi service in the world...You Muppet.
uninterested in scab propaganda, Kent.
The difference between a Taxi and Private hire is in the name,One is hired on the spot,and the fare dictated by the goverment,the other is or should be pre booked,and the fare dictated by the individual,As far as the M4 buslane being empty 16 hours a day,well if thats the case why do you want acess unles its to give you an unfair advantage over Taxis,ie you can quote,lower fares,If the goverment decided to allow minicabs access to buslanes but only if they were Bentleys,you would soon scream,but why i am dictated to what vehicle i drive,Also lets go back to the name [PRIVATE].so on your way of thinking tell me what is the difference between private hire,and a private car,except you have had a medical and filled in a form,so what is the difference between you and a private car driver,none,should they be allowed in buslanes as well,The average taxi driver may not be better than the average minicab driver,But again he has done an extra driving test to prove he is,There is not a minicab driver out there who does not wish he was a Taxi driver,They just want to get in the back door with no real commitment on thier part,And the i have a family and cant afford to do the knowledge dont wash,as i and many like me had a full time job and fitted the knowledge in around it,Why do you think the likes of GRIFFIN want the buslanes so much,its not for the passengers benifit Its purely to earn him more money not you,You see if a TAXI driver rents a cab,he pays his rent and everything else he earns is his,with the minicab,he pays his rent,and a percentage of the jobs he does,if he owns his own car,he may not pay to rent a car from them,but still pays a percentage of the jobs he does,Again thats not the case with ADDI/LEE,as he insists you rent one of his,So now tell me how your equal,when the very people that employ you,just look on you as a cash cow,Wake up mate.GARYS
ReplyDeleteA passionate argument but perhaps a little ill informed, but I have no doubt that you are passionate about your trade. The rules of vehicle type are set by the authorities and that’s the way the taxi rules have been for decades but you decided to train for a taxi badge rather than a PH badge – your choice, but what’s that got to do with bus lanes.
ReplyDeleteThe difference between PH and private car is the use its being put to – like it or not, PH go from A to B carrying fare paying passengers – just like a taxi does, the only difference is the vehicle they are in, how the passenger came to be in it, and how the fare is worked out. I could apply your same bus lane reasoning to an ‘off duty taxi’ driver, do they use the bus lanes when off duty, of course they do and at that time they too are just like a private car . . . and they get free parking on taxi ranks . . .
I have never had occasion to drive in the M4 bus lane with a passenger on board if I did and I get stopped the police will take 20 minutes to hand me a ticket and that will delay me and my passenger and defeats the object of driving in the bus lane in the first place - and it costs me £60 and that’s not good either. But when I look to my right I see EMPTY taxi’s blatting back to London with their hire light on and I’m in black traffic in the middle lane, I ask if that’s fair. A simple answer is you/we only use a bus lane if you got a passenger on board, that keeps all the empty taxis and PH out of the way so buses and working taxi/PH can get through quicker – easy - share the road.
I know all about the PCO taxi driving test - so enough said there I think. . . and I reckon that if as you say, every mini cab driver wants to be a taxi driver they would all be on the knowledge right now doing it whilst driving their mini cabs around full time - like you did holding down a full time job – that makes sense don’t it . . . . I am not on the knowledge and I have no desire to drive a taxi, and I don’t think many of the other 30/40/50,000 + PH drivers are either, and I bet you are glad they are not.
PH has been around for 40 years but the two camps will never live in harmony with each other but the other ain’t going away so don’t get blood pressure over a bus lane; I have no desire to die of a seizure in the driving seat of my PH and I’m sure you don’t either . . . .
Be Lucky . . .
PS - don’t CON CAB and Radio Taxi drivers pay their masters commission . . . .
no desire to drive a taxi?well what are you doing on a site primarily for taxi drivers?you really need to get out more mate.....the difference between taxis and ph is the same as man utd and carlisle....they are both football teams but one is soooooooo much better than the other.we may both drive people from a to b for a living but we taxi drivers served what essentially was an apprenticeship to do so,whilst you things essentially want the same rights without doing the hard work....this is why there are 30/50000 of you idiots driving around london.we are the best taxi service in the world......you lot arent even the best mini cab service in england!ps....taxi driving test?enough said?what would you know?your not a taxi driver so you really cant make any type of comment innuendo or otherwise about it....get a life mate..............................
ReplyDeleteI strongly believe we need to act all together,the only way is to fight hard,by having a massive demo not a single cab working and blocking all london I know a lot of people will suffer but that's the only way to get this trade back and the respect use to have, John Griffin is having a laugh now lets make crie for the rest of his life....
ReplyDelete