A plan by Pendle Borough Council to introduce a dress code for taxi cab drivers has met fierce opposition from within the trade. Drivers’ organisations are accusing the council of being insensitive to the feelings and needs of their drivers, even going as far as to accuse the council of deliberate racial discrimination.
New Taxi Cab Drivers Dress Code
The council have been examining plans which they say would ‘raise and maintain the profile’ of the taxi cab trade in Pendle. The proposal would oblige drivers to be smartly dressed while working. Football and rugby tops, shorts, tracksuits, beachwear and flip-flops would all be banned. Women would not be allowed to wear short skirts or dresses and any article displaying ‘offensive’ or ‘suggestive’ words or graphics would also be seen as unacceptable.
However, the new dress code would also ban drivers from wearing a shalwar kameez, a traditional Asian outfit. A large proportion of the authority’s taxi cab drivers are Asian men and many of them regularly wear this kind of outfit while working.
Unhappy
Chairman of Pendle Private Hire Association, Mohammed Akram, has attacked the proposals, stating that it has made many taxi cab drivers extremely unhappy. He said:
“A lot of taxi drivers are saying it would be discrimination because it would take away their rights.”
Mohammed Shafiq, chief executive of the Ramadhan Foundation, also pointed out that cab drivers could look smart in traditional dress.
He said: “It’s not acceptable to tell people they can’t wear dress that they wear for religious requirements or duties and it’s important public authorities recognise and respect that.”
Licensing Committee to Discuss Plan
Pendle’s Taxi Licensing Committee is set to discuss the proposals at a forthcoming meeting. At the meeting, committee members will be told that 19 out of the 25 taxi cab operators that responded to a previous questionnaire were opposed to the plans.
Pendle Borough council’s engineering and special projects manager, Peter Atkinson stated ahead of the meeting: “It was agreed in principle at the November meeting of the taxi licensing committee that a dress code be introduced. The actual detail of such a code has yet to be agreed and will be debated at the committee’s meeting.”
Head of the licensing committee, Councillor Pauline McCormick argued: “A dress code will raise and maintain the professionalism of the taxi trade.”