ES Views: Revoking Uber’s licence is a disaster for Londoners

The decision by Transport for London to revoke Uber’s licence is a disaster for Londoners. It is choosing to punish the 3.5 million Londoners who regularly use Uber because it’s cheaper, safer and quicker. This decision jeopardises the livelihoods of 40,000 drivers who choose to use the app because it gives them valuable flexibility.

The only people who will benefit are the black-cab lobby, who have crushed a competitor through cronyism rather than provide a better service. Londoners will face higher prices, longer wait times and will no longer benefit from a safe service where every journey is logged and tracked by GPS.

Sadiq Khan likes to claim that London is open, but this decision sends a powerful message that London is completely closed to innovation, competition and business.
Sam Dumitriu, Adam Smith Institute

Transport for London made the right decision not to renew Uber’s licence in London. We have long made the case that Uber is not fit to operate on our streets as it repeatedly breaks the law, exploits its drivers and has no consideration for the safety of its passengers. It is high time that this was recognised.

We support technological innovation in the market — passengers across London can hail black cabs via the Gett and mytaxi apps, and from January all new black cabs will be zero-emissions capable.

This licensing decision is about passenger safety. The Metropolitan Police, MPs and the taxi industry have all expressed concern about the serious threat that Uber’s unlawful operation poses to the safety of the public. It has no place on London’s streets.

Uber will no doubt take TfL to court over its attempts to ensure the safety of Londoners, and we will urge the court to uphold this decision.
Steve McNamara, general secretary, Licensed Taxi Drivers’ Association

I am absolutely delighted that Transport for London has revoked Uber’s licence. Apart from the company’s attitude to taxes and employee rights, the lack of checks on its drivers has been a concern for me for some time.

Earlier this year the Metropolitan Police raised the point that Uber was not reporting allegations of sexual assaults by its drivers on passengers, and in May 2016 we learnt that in the previous 12 months there had been 32 allegations of sexual assault by Uber drivers on their female passengers.

I wish their fares were cheaper, but London’s black-cab drivers are thoroughly vetted, and I urge TfL to apply the same strict protocol when any other cab companies apply for licences in the future.
Ann Nee

Brilliant news. Have readers ever wondered why Uber cabs are cheap? It’s because they don’t pay tax.
Sarah Docherty

I have had lots of Uber trips and all the drivers have been polite, with lovely clean cars. You have their name, car registration and operative number. I hope Uber wins on appeal.
Sue Curtis

To those supporting Uber for the sake of saving a few quid: there is plenty of choice out there and no one is forcing you to use a black cab — use a minicab if you despise the world-leading, gold-standard service so much. Regulation is there for the public’s safety, and Uber have zero regard for that. To argue otherwise is absurd.
Simon Kelly

First the Garden Bridge and now Uber: Sadiq Khan is showing how to stand up to the rich and powerful in the interests of all Londoners. Hopefully, a reputable company, one that puts passenger safety first and treats its drivers with respect, will come and take Uber’s place.
Andy Harvey

May was right to admonish Trump

I know nobody was expecting fine words, elegance of thought or philosophical musings, and still less diplomacy in Donald Trump’s address to the United Nations, but Theresa May’s response was welcome [“May takes veiled swipe at Trump over his climate change stance during UN speech”, September 21].

Yet although climate change is important, the issue would be irrelevant should this belligerent leader of the free world carry out his threat to “crush” North Korea. She needs to quietly tell him that such brinkmanship is unwelcome.
Susan Collins

Never was a truer word spoken [“Kim Jong-un called Donald Trump deranged”, September 22]. We are leaderless and the US doesn’t have a President.

Americans now have a man in the White House who is wreaking havoc and we await the day when a real president arrives to replace him. Donald Trump is many things but the leader of a nation he is not.
David Jennings

To all the Donald Trump bashers calling him deranged or a warmonger: tell me, when was the last time President Trump executed his own uncle? In public?
Ant Goldsworthy

The Labours of Jeremy Corbyn

In the centenary year of the Russian Revolution, the splits in the Labour Party described by Rosamund Urwin [“War of the roses: meet the feuding factions attending the Labour Party conference”, September 21] — between the hard-Left faction orchestrated by Seumas Milne and the moderates, especially those MPs who put Jeremy Corbyn on the ballot paper because they thought it would be sporting to let him have a go — are reminiscent of the struggles between the Mensheviks and the Bolsheviks. And we all know how that ended: Stalin, gulags and famine in the Ukraine. Elizabeth Balsom

The more the Standard uses terms such as “hard Left”, “Trotskyist” and “Leninist” to describe Corbyn’s Labour, the more the public becomes immune to your political bias, so please carry on. When you say “Britain is becoming nervous” you clearly mean the minority of Britons, a tiny fraction of whose wealth may be under threat to help the needy. Dave Yeates

In Gavin Stamp’s review of Simon Jenkins’s book about British railway stations [September 21], he refers to “the rise, fall and rise again” of our railways. The second rise came about due to the Conservatives de-nationalising the railways and returning them to private-sector ownership.

A Jeremy Corbyn government would renationalise them and, no doubt, precipitate a fall once again in our railways.
Tim Janman

Basquiat show is emporer's clothes

I cannot agree with Matthew Collings’ assessment of Jean-Michel Basquiat’s art as “strikingly original” in his review of the Boom For Real exhibition at the Barbican [“The superstar who scrawled to the top”, September 21].

If ever there was a case for calling out a collection of amateur daubings and messy collages and low-grade street art as a case of the emperor’s clothes, then this is it. And surely it is obvious to any art lover that an early death — sad though it is — is a surefire way to cement an artist’s reputation, however undeserved it may be.

The fact that somone parted with $100m for one of Basquiat’s paintings earlier this year is evidence, if evidence is needed, that a fool and his money are easily parted.
Victoria Kelly

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Harvey as England Women's coach would be welcome

Whatever the rights and wrongs of Mark Sampson’s departure as manager of the England women’s football team, it is good news that former Arsenal coach Laura Harvey is considered to be the frontrunner to take over.

This is a woman who knows her football, has a good record as a manager and about whom there has never been a suggestion of “inappropriate” behaviour. If she is appointed, I wish her well.
Tony Butterworth

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