Police and Taxi associations support in-car cameras, signage, driver registry

Tools should be in place before launch of Northlander Rideshare Pilot 

Ontario should take advantage of both time-tested safety tools and new technologies to prevent crime as it launches the Northlander Rideshare Pilot for American firms like Uber and Lyft, says the CTA.

Ontario has noted that the regulations created for the Northlander train route may serve as the basis for province-wide regulations later.

“The Canadian Taxi Association has been working with the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police for almost two years in order to create a plan to repair the safety deficits created when U.S. corporations like Uber and Lyft were allowed to do business in 2016,” says Marc André Way, president of the CTA.

“Proven basics like effective signage and a registry of drivers can now be combined with technologies such as in-car security cameras and a windshield label with a QR code linking to the centralized driver database. It is incumbent upon Ontario to create and implement a leading-edge information system as it prepares to launch the Northlander Rideshare Pilot.

“We have the technology. Let’s use it now to improve safety,” Way points out. “These improvements should be in place before the Pilot is launched.”

With regard to the Pilot, the Ontario Association of Chiefs of Police has stated:

“The OACP supports some key issues raised by the Canadian Taxi Association (CTA) in their feedback that addresses a proposed, revised set of protocols for the ground transportation industry throughout all of Ontario.  We have maintained ongoing engagement with the CTA for close to two years now to collaborate on any and all issues of the ground transportation industry in Ontario as it relates to public safety. 

Specifically, we feel there is tangible merit for inclusion of the following aspects and features of a revised ground transportation system that supports and strengthens public safety for all industry users, inclusive of both customers and drivers alike.  These include:

• The clear public safety value of having in-car video cameras that capture and record activity.  The inclusion of this technology tool allows for a proper method of objectively recording activity that occurs during a ground transportation service call, in the event unlawful behaviour is initiated – either by the driver, the passenger(s), or another party who comes into contact with the aforementioned. 
• Video footage is a proven tool that police routinely leverage when conducting follow up investigations of crime and other problematic incidents to assist in achieving outcomes that bring justice, as circumstances dictate.

• The public safety validation of a ground transportation vendor’s driver and vehicle legitimacy to ensure all customers are knowingly being provided with a service that is safe and appropriate.  It is our recommendation such validation should, presumably, come in the form of proper, standardized, government-issued signage that is affixed (not portable in form) and prominently displayed in the same location on every vehicle authorized to provide ground transportation services in Ontario.

• The creation of a consistently maintained, accurate central database of all approved and authorized drivers and vehicles.  Such a reliable database of vendors will greatly facilitate the ability for police to quickly check/verify identities in situations to which they are called to assess and intervene.

Additionally, the OACP also supports the public safety concerns raised by the Women’s Trucking Federation of Canada (WTFC) and the “Know Human Trafficking” (KHT) group in their feedback on this matter.  We feel the recommended measures for enhanced safety we have outlined in our remarks here would effectively address the concerns raised by these two organizations.”

In addition to taking part in 3 of the 4 MTO video conference “engagement” sessions held in March, the CTA has submitted a comprehensive analysis of the Northlander Pilot site.

The CTA submission organizes its concerns in two broad categories: Public Safety Harms and Market Destruction Harms:

“Public safety harm — passenger injury or death. The Northern Rideshare Framework, as announced, would authorise the commercial transportation of passengers including women travelling alone at night; seniors; persons with disabilities; and Indigenous community members, along a remote 740-kilometre corridor.

Operators would be subject to no independent driver screening standard; no law enforcement engagement protocol; no verified insurance framework for rural service; and no human trafficking identification or reporting requirement.

It would do so before Ontario has established the public governance architecture needed to oversee, audit, or enforce the obligations of the platform through which those services will be provided.

Market destruction harm – The Northern Rideshare Framework as announced confers favoured market status on US-headquartered rideshare corporations over licensed domestic operators along the Northlander corridor.

State-subsidized asymmetric market entry, through lighter practical standards and rules, will crush licensed taxi and ground transportation operators in Huntsville, North Bay, Sudbury, and other corridor communities. Operators will suffer plate devaluation, market displacement, and goodwill destruction. The damages are real, foreseeable and non-remote.”

“Our submission is not a transportation policy objection. It is a public interest intervention,” says Way.