Pleas of taxi and Uber drivers in Portsmouth to be heard over vandalism fears

Members of Portsmouth City Council's licensing committee are due to consider the concerns of private hire and hackney carriage drivers following what was described as a 'terrible' spate of vandalism.

Drivers have argued that identifiable signs on their cars make them targets for vandals and are asking to use temporary magnetic signs.

Uber driver Peter Sutherland said: 'It is our belief that taxi and private hire vehicles are being singled out for wanton vandalism, because they are easy targets.

'All vehicles are adorned with operators’ livery, council livery, a taxi/private hire licence plate (rear of vehicle), in addition to windscreen stickers and an internal sticker, both showing the vehicle licence number.

'That makes seven pieces of identification, which has to be regarded as total overkill.'

According to police data Portsmouth had the highest number of recorded vehicle crimes in Hampshire in 2018 with 2,704.

The following year there were 1,656.

However, Inspector Marcus Cator, neighbourhood inspector for Portsmouth believed the taxi signs were not linked to vehicle vandalism. He said: 'Regards the livery on cars, I cannot provide any evidence to suggest that taxi drivers or their cars are targeted for damage or assaults within Portsmouth.

'We do have a very large taxi demographic and they do suffer from crime within their work and role, however, this is largely unreported.'

Andrew Peters, secretary of the GMB Brighton and Hove taxi section, agreed. He said: 'As there are many Portsmouth private hire vehicles working here in Brighton we consider that it would be a retrograde step if these vehicles were allowed to remove livery identification.

'Once a private hire vehicle is out of sight of their respective licensing enforcement officers sadly they tend to bend and break rules.

'We recommend that the council approves the use of a window sticker that says "no money or valuables are left in the vehicle" should any driver wish to display this.'

Councillors will debate taxi livery at a licensing meeting on Thursday, February 20.