London black cab drivers will soon be able to offer rides on ride-sharing platform Uber Announced Wednesday, in the latest attempt to settle a contentious dispute between the company and the city's flagship taxi service.
The service will be offered in early 2024 and will allow black cabs to see a destination in advance and book passengers through the Uber app. But will taxi drivers sign up?
The two have been adversaries since the app's arrival in London more than a decade ago, shaking up the taxi sector. London's black cabs, also known as hackney carriages, have crisscrossed the capital in one form or another since 1634, and taxi drivers must pass “the Knowledge,” known as the world's toughest taxi exam, to earn their badges. .
Uber, on the other hand, has a lower barrier to entry for its drivers and has always considered London to be one of its most lucrative markets. In recent years, the app has expanded to allow users in the city to book train trips, boat rides, and even flights to other cities.
The ride-sharing company framed the announcement as a partnership, sweetening the deal for new drivers by eliminating the percentage of their fare that goes to Uber for the first six months. The first drivers, he said, had already begun signing up. Uber said it needed several hundred drivers to sign up before it could launch the service.
But many London taxi drivers had a scathing response.
“We don't need a partnership with Uber,” the Licensed Taxi Drivers Association, a union that represents the majority of the city's nearly 18,000 taxi drivers, said in the headline of a Wednesday statement.
There was “no demand” for such an association from taxi drivers, the union's general secretary, Steve McNamara, said in a statement, adding that its members were unlikely to even consider joining the platform.
“We have no interest in tarnishing the name of London's iconic and world-famous black cab business by aligning it with Uber, its poor safety record and everything that comes with it.”
“It's a big step down for us and a demotion for professional taxi drivers,” said Howard Taylor, who has worked as a taxi driver in London for 36 years. He said he had worked too hard to associate with the company, which he believed offered poor service. “If they were offering double the meter and no commission, I still wouldn't sign up with them.”
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“Unless you get a certain number of drivers, you can't really offer the service,” a union spokeswoman said, adding that the union was skeptical that Uber would find a “critical mass.”
The company said Wednesday, the first day drivers could sign up, that it was “incredibly happy” with their progress.
The backlash represented the latest round of tensions between the San Francisco company and local taxi industries, a fight that has played out in several countries since the company's rapid international expansion.
After Uber arrived in London, thousands of black taxi drivers protested by blocking streets in 2014. The company tried to recruit black taxis to its platform that year, the union said, but added that only a handful of drivers joined.
Uber has long been fighting with local authorities to continue operating in the British capital. In a blow in 2019, the city's transportation authority refused to renew its license after saying the company had violated rules that had put passenger safety at risk. That decision was overturned in court the following year, and Uber, which had been allowed to operate during the appeal, regained its license.
Taxi drivers in other cities such as New York, Rome and Paris already use Uber to book services, the company said in its announcement.
“We know that black cab adoption will not happen overnight. However, the reality is that taxi drivers around the world want to partner with us,” Uber said in response to a request for more information.
But London's taxi union said black cabs were also available to book on other apps and drivers did not need another platform.
