Hold On, Uber Might Not Be Getting Legalised In NSW After All
Hold your horses, everybody.
Earlier this year, the April/May issue of official NSW Taxi Council magazine Meter felt confident enough to ask “Is the tide turning on UberX?“. Turns out it was, but not in the direction the Taxi Council would like. Since then, taxi companies and drivers have suffered a number of major legal and PR defeats. Two taxi drivers were charged in October after luring an Uber driver to a location in Brisbane and assaulting him, and two weeks ago Victorian Taxis’ ill-conceived #YourTaxis social media campaign backfired spectacularly, becoming a one-stop shop for people to recount their terrible experiences in cabs.
Over the same period, the domestic fortunes of ridesharing company Uber have gone from strength to strength. Once illegal across every Australian jurisdiction, commercial ridesharing was legalised in Canberra in September and the Queensland state government has ordered a report into ridesharing services due out next August.
This morning, it seemed that Uber had won their biggest battle yet. An exclusive scoop in today’s Daily Telegraph reported that the NSW government intends to legalise Uber and other ridesharing services next month. Numerous outlets picked up the story, including the Guardian and 9 News, but it turns out the Tele might have gotten a little ahead of itself. Premier Mike Baird has come out saying those reports are premature and that no decision’s been made on the fate of Uber and other ridesharing services just yet.
“Well, that’s jumped the gun, no doubt about it, “Baird told Sydney radio station 2UE this morning. “What we’ve agreed to do is to have this issue looked at, and Gary Sturgess, who’s obviously well respected in public policy, has looked at this issue for us and prepared a report and made some recommendations. That’s come in to the Department of Transport and is being considered, but it is yet to go beyond that. Obviously that report will be considered as part of the due process of government and it will go to Cabinet in good time, and when that is done we’ll have much more to say about it.”