A Taxi Driver asked boris what he was doing about the increasing problem of minicab touting. Again, tired and misleading statistics previously used by Gareth Emmerson and Sir Peter Hendy were dragged out, as if Boris had been given a script.
One taxi driver asked Boris what he intended to do about the fact that private hire vehicle owners do not have to produce hire and reward insurgence at the NSL licensing inspection, in the same way licensed Taxi owners do.
There was loud applause from the audience.
Another driver asked what he was doing about Uber, which bought lots of angry heckling, as mayor attempted to explain what he's trying to do, to address the Uber meter issue.
The question was also raised about the amount of touting and the lack of enforcement .
Boris said
" We are ruthless against touts with over 8000 arrests".
This bought loud jeers from the audience some shouting out;
"Liar"
"Only 34 convictions last year"
"Lies!, more lies!" and
"Scandalous".
One Taxi driver asked him what he, as head of TfL, intended to do about their woefully inadequate running of the Taxi and Private Hire trades in London. Boris was obviously taken aback by the questions from the Taxi trade and looked uncomfortable, bumbling and unprepared.
A commentator on Twitter said "No taxis in London tonight, they're all in Haringey, heckling Boris".
On the ULEZ Boris said "We have secured huge funding for air quality from the government. I don't want to see taxi drivers forced to buy ultra clean cars" (freudian slip perhaps), he did not mention if any of the funding would be used in subsidising cleaner TAXIS.
He was unconvincing in his replies and seemed to have a tirade of statistics which bore no relation to the experiences of the people here on all the subjects raised.
