“We crushed the Taxi industry, and we crushed their families” Minnan-Wong admits as he retires
Ward 16 Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong has announced he is not running for re-election. Photo: Toronto.ca
Toronto’s Ward 16 Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong says the 2015 vote to allow Uber in Toronto was part of the Mayor’s Agenda, and that he now regrets voting to support it.
“We crushed the Taxi industry, and we crushed their families,” Minnan-Wong admitted in a radio interview with the CBC’s Jill Dempsey on July 14th.
Dempsey asked him,“When you look back at your time at Toronto City Hall, if you had a chance, for one do over vote, what would it be?”
Minnan-Wong stumbled for a moment before he admitting, “One thing I would do over is the Uber vote.”
“You know, Jill, you’ve seen all the articles about how bad Uber was, is,” he went on, apparently referring to the recently released Uber Files, “and all the nonsense that went on, back in the day when we approved them.
“When we did that, we crushed the taxi industry, and we crushed their families.
“When you’re deputy mayor, you’re obliged to support the mayor’s agenda, which I did,” he explained. “You know sometimes there’s going to be a level of disagreement, but as the deputy mayor, that’s part of the assignment when you get the appointment.
“But I was I was very uncomfortable with it. In fact, I refused to meet with Uber at the time, because I knew they were liars. But because I was deputy mayor, I had to vote for this. If I were to do it all over again, I would not have I would have not have voted to allow Uber into the city of Toronto.”
