Private cabbies 'losing business' to bus service

Westlink covers for axed bus routes

Private taxi drivers at a railway station claim they are being undercut by a cheap bus service.

Westlink is a subsidised service set up by the West of England Combined Authority (WECA) to cover for axed bus routes.

It normally runs a shuttlebus service at Parkway in Bristol, but in the last couple of weeks has been using cars to run the service instead.

Taxi drivers say it means people are walking past the taxi rank, and taking the Westlink car for £2 per ticket price.

Vaughan Hinsley, private cab driver, told BBC Radio Bristol he is losing business.

"It's very galling that they're parking in the car park," he said.

"We've got ex-customers walking past our taxis where we're providing a service - You've got to bear in mind this is taxpayers' money.

"It must cost at least £20 an hour to keep these vehicles on the road. It costs £2.40 just to sit in my taxi."

'A temporary measure'

WECA said the taxis were a temporary measure while WestLink got a new fleet of smaller minibuses approved.

A WECA spokesperson said: "Because of a short delay in getting the new vehicles approved by South Gloucestershire Council and from the Traffic Commission’s Office for them to use bus stops, there were a number of temporary taxi saloons that couldn’t use the bus stops.

"This may have led some taxi drivers to believe that they were operating like taxis, but going forward it will operate in the same way that Westlink has since last year, just with smaller minibuses."