Monday, May 6, 2024

Author: Rita Smith

Media releaseNewsRide Hailing newsTaxi industry news

Beck Taxi sues City of Toronto over lack of training, public safety

Rita Smith

In a last-ditch effort to hold the City of Toronto accountable for the safety of all road users, Beck Taxi is taking the municipal government to court.

The application maintains that the City has failed in its mandate to create and implement regulations that protect public safety by allowing thousands of untrained commercial drivers to fill our streets. Prior to 2016, taxicab drivers were required to receive extensive training as a condition to drive. The training covered safe driving, the Human Rights Code, the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA), geography, driver safety, and customer service.

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Delivery/Courier newsNews

Purolator firing workers over outdated COVID policies

Rita Smith

“The only thing the Purolator’s COVID policy existed to do was to stop the spread of COVID-19,” says Vincent Favreau. “Purolator now knows the shot did not, and does not stop transmission of the virus. While other employers are bringing employees back and in some cases providing back-pay, Purolator is firing people,” says Favreau, who was sent home without pay on January 10, 2022. He received a letter severing his employment on November 26th.

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NewsRide Hailing newsTaxi industry news

“It’s a joke” that Toronto doesn’t acknowledge its own training program, says Taxi veteran

Rita Smith

Toronto’s refusal to acknowledge any previous Taxi driver training has nothing to do with public safety, says 36-year veteran driver Jafar Mirsalari.

“It’s a formality, but it has nothing to do with public safety,” says Mirsalari. “It’s a money grab, it’s just window dressing. It’s a way for them to claim these tens of thousands of rideshare drivers now have training. Six hours of training with an online test? It’s a joke.

“This is not going to reduce the number of aggressive drivers on the road, and it is not going to professional customer service to the industry.”

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Opinion/ColumnTaxi industry newsTrucking

Ottawa experiences with robbery, drug dealers, murder: I’d feel safer with more Truck drivers

Rita Smith

Listening to Chrystia Freeland and her friends testifying at the recent Public Order Emergency Commission (PEOC) hearings, you might take away the impression that Ottawa was a bucolic ‘burb, a sleepy, peaceful village free of crime and danger before the horn-honking Freedom Convoy Truckers arrived on January 29th, 2022.

Actually, even some of the nicer parts of Ottawa (the Glebe, Parliament Hill, the Byward Market) can be cesspools of drug dealing, crime and violence. I have no doubt the reports that crime actually dropped after the Truckers arrived are true.

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NewsTrucking

CSIS reported no violence, no Section 2 violation; Miller wins fight for unredacted documents

Rita Smith

Convoy lawyer Brendan Miller’s fight to gain access to unredacted documents from senior political staff provided immediate results yesterday.

Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino was surprised with a written record of notes which indicated the Canadian Security and Intelligency Service (CSIS) did not believe the Freedom Convoy met the standard required by Section Two of the CSIS Act, a requirement for invoking the Emergencies Act.

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