ES Views: Should Uber have been given licence to start with?

Transport for London may have justifiable reasons for deciding not to renew Uber’s licence but considering TfL’s clear aim to promote public transport, then perhaps it could also explain why it believed it was appropriate to licence 40,000 drivers in the first place?

Not only should employment conditions and driving standards be monitored, they should also ensure that all private-hire vehicles, irrespective of the kind of engine in use, pay road taxes and the congestion charge, given the very significant impact they have on overall traffic volumes and flows affecting all other road users.

Some of the protests made so far by Uber and its (subsidised) customers against TfL’s decision to ban the transport app only serves to provide another example of where private individual convenience is deemed to outweigh the greater public good.
Dave Taylor

I can only laugh at Sadiq Khan’s comments in support of Transport for London’s Uber ban. While I agree that Uber should be regulated to act within a level playing field, it is one of a handful of companies promoting cleaner transport within London.

The Mayor’s upcoming Low Emissions Charge exempts polluting diesel black cabs from this charge, failing to address a significant cause of harmful pollutants within the city centre. TfL should improve its offer to replace and decommission these polluters, given that they do not need to be scrapped until they are 15 years old, or force their hand by including them in this charge.

Given that Khan likes to go on about equality so much, perhaps it is time we got some.
Ryan Kingsnorth

In this day and age of technological advances, it seems we are happy to give up our safety in order to save a few pounds here and there. On countless occasions, I have been driven to the wrong address because my Uber driver had no knowledge of the area he was working in, and many people have claimed they have been attacked while in a Uber car.

Uber is not the be all and end all of travelling around London. We should put the faith back in our black-cab drivers to take us safely from A to B.
Emily Russell

I have lived in London for 40 years and I’d never had any problems getting black cabs or minicabs when needed, so for Uber to lose its licence is hardly a transport disaster nor even a mild inconvenience.

It is also laughable for the company to complain that TfL is giving in to “interest groups”, given that Uber itself is no stranger to political lobbying. TfL should be applauded for applying its rules fairly; there should be no special case for Uber or any other cab operator.
Roger Backhouse

Cabinet rows are petty, not sinister

It beggars belief that Simon Diggins [Letters, September 22] can liken the Cabinet’s squabbles over Brexit to what happened in Adolf Hitler’s bunker, let alone describe the latter as reasonable by comparison.

Quite apart from Hitler himself, let’s not forget that Frau Goebbels murdered her children in cold blood. To compare the antics of arguing politicians to such barbarity is an insult to the Reich’s victims.

This is not to say, of course, that we cannot draw on the lessons of history’s darkest moments as we look to the future. But perhaps the fact that the EU’s leaders have seldom displayed any capacity to learn from their own mistakes should give us more reason to hope that the future will be brighter outside the bloc.
Matt Showering

Labour is avoiding the issue on Brexit

The Labour Party has chosen not to have a meaningful discussion about Brexit, and therefore it doesn’t matter that Sadiq Khan wants to stay in the single market because there will be no vote regarding its position.

This is a sign that Labour is being controlled by Momentum and that it is protecting Jeremy Corbyn from the embarrassment of having to take a position on the most crucial matter of our generation. It is an affront to democracy and an abdication of Labour’s duty as the Opposition.
Annabel Mullin, Lib-Dem candidate for Kensington

Don't hide behind stats on cyclists

Rosamund Urwin appears to suggest that, because figures say only two pedestrians were killed by cyclists in 2015 it’s less significant than a cyclist being killed [“Stiffer sentences for cyclists won’t make roads safer”, Comment, September 22].

Surely a lost life is still a lost life, whatever statistical relation it bears to anything else.

There may be worse incidents, but that does not mean that we do not need to curb the excesses of some in the cycling fraternity.
Gordon Thompson

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BP is not a worthy museum sponsor

With climate chaos linked to the burning of fossil fuels apparent around the world, why should BP be allowed to sponsor the British Museum without being challenged?

It gives BP undeserved advertising and social legitimacy, especially when its support makes up less than 0.5 per cent of the museum’s budget. BP wanted to drill for oil in the Arctic, it was responsible for the Deepwater Horizon spill in 2010 and has helped trash indigenous lands.

If the activists’ stunts annoy current museum-goers, it is nothing compared to how furious future generations will be when they learn how easily British cultural institutions could be bought.
Vicky Cowell

Strike prices mislead on wind farm costs

Spin put by green activists on the Government awarding contracts to three large offshore wind farms has misled many into thinking offshore wind costs are falling.

Strike prices are a poor guide to expenditure and capital costs for offshore wind will remain high while moving into deeper water. The sites are uneconomic at the prices set and developers are betting on fossil fuel prices rising or a higher carbon price, both which are remote post-Brexit.
Rev Dr John Cameron

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Eagles are already looking doomed

It was devastating to witness yet another defeat and another game without a goal for Crystal Palace during the 5-0 defeat by Manchester City. Relegation seems inevitable — maybe that might be a good thing.

For several years, Palace have flirted with the drop before Tony Pulis or Sam Allardyce arrived to save them. But the board failed to buy the players Frank De Boer wanted in the summer and now Roy Hodgson is left with an inadequate squad.

If relegation does arrive in May, it will have been a long time coming.
D Coles

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