The Consell de Ibiza could manage the taxis of the entire island
Ehe second vice president of the Consell and Minister of Mobility, Javier Torres, is committed to the island institution assuming control and management of the taxi service, now in the hands of the municipalities.
“This is the future of taxi management, whether it arrives in three or seven years, but the sooner it does, the better for users and the industry.”
On an island like Ibiza, which has an area of 571 square kilometers, it makes no sense that there are five taxi services, with municipal borders, “says Torres, who assures that the majority of the taxi sector thinks the same.
The first step on this path has already been agreed with the municipalities.
The next study to determine the number of seasonal licenses needed (for 2022) to meet the demand will be done by the Consell.
An insular analysis will also be carried out, and not of each municipality, to assess whether the fixed taxi fleet should be expanded, according to Torres.
“It is the best way, and the most objective, to identify if more taxis are needed.”
Meeting with the sector
The vice president raised the possibility of the Consell controlling the public taxi service on the island a few days ago in a meeting that he held by videoconference with the representatives of all the sector associations.
The Consell sent them a report on the prior consultation of the future regulation in which this proposal is already made.
This document indicates that this option, that of creating a supra-municipal body, “had been discarded in recent years because it entailed the transfer of municipal powers.”
This meeting also addressed the modification of the loading order that, despite having been agreed with the municipalities, the Consell is now willing to introduce changes at the proposal of the sector.
Torres argues that there was a “rush” to approve the new loading order to solve the problem affecting Vila about the use of GPS (municipal regulations do not foresee that services can be offered to taxis from other municipalities) for this summer.
However, the first attempt to approve the fast-track loading order in the Parliament was unsuccessful and then the tourist season began, further decimated by the health crisis.
This order must be processed by the Balearic Government and also submitted to the opinion of the Consell Consultiu.
Torres clarifies that the new loading order must be “a transition tool” and that “it will not fix some problems”, such as, for example, the impossibility of applying an automatic sanction to the taxi driver who refuses to provide a service.
«Now a sanction file must be processed that the taxi driver can reach four months and maybe then it doesn’t matter. If automatic sanctions are applied [dos horas de paralización del vehículo, por ejemplo], the taxi driver would think twice whether or not to refuse a service.
To do this, we will have to wait for the regulation.
“According to what things cannot be put in the loading order because it is not a regulation and the Consell Consultiu could knock it down.”
The second vice president maintains that “the objective” is for the regulation to be ready in 2022.
Ibiza’s new taxi regulation will not be ready this summer
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The Consell de Ibiza could manage the taxis of the entire island
