A spokesman for the London Taxi Drivers Forum, Jonathan Myers explained to me why the taxi drivers were up in arms. "Transport for London have got to enforce the law and sit down with people like us to find a way to through this mess in London at night. Its about a proper transport system, taxis underground and buses. Putting kids into illegal cars is just criminal. There are 10 to 12 sexual assaults a month mainly out in the suburbs."
His outrage was mainly focused at the illegal mini cab drivers who come into the city and take work from black cab drivers, undermining the whole system and creating a dangerous atmosphere whilst giving all cab drivers a bad name.
Another cabbie explained that last week "a taxi driver had his wrist broken by the police. He was dragged out of his cab and thrown on the floor like he just shot someone. They detained him for 25 minutes and then just let him go with no charge." The man involved was John Melvill who was taking part in another demonstration held by cabbies on May 26th. This happened in Aldwych right where the police had blocked off the road today in a move to try to prevent the cabbies from keeping the road block in motion. However, it did not phase the taxi drivers one bit who carried on down the Strand and ultimately back to Aldwych until the road was reopened at 1610 and traffic began to circulate again.
Jonathan Myers insisted that we are now in a "period to allow the authorities time to come and sit with us and discuss what our grievances are about. If they decide not to, after the world cup we will start doing other things. It can't be that every time we go on a radio show virtually everyone apart from illegal mini cab drivers agree with what we are doing."
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