Page 24 - drive a2b may 2020

LE GAL

Licence

Owners

take on QLD

QUEENSLAND government

NEWS

Just over six years ago Brisbane's taxi licences
were trading for more than $500,000 and
since the introduction of rideshare entities to
Queensland, the licences have plummeted to
$75,000 in the metropolitan areas.

A group of Queensland taxi licence owners
banded together and lodged a court case
against the Queensland government, as they
claimed that they had been unjustly treated
when rideshare came to town. They claimed
that the government did not require the new
operators to pay for taxi licences, as they were
allegedly not taxis, and therefore that had
an unfair advantage over the traditional taxi
operators who had paid thousands of dollars for
the right to ply for passengers fares. And in so
doing made a very uneven playing field in the
personalised transport sector in Queensland.
Last month this case came before the Supreme
Court which ruled against the group of 1300
taxi licence owners. Justice Thomas Bradley
found against them in their claim for equitable
compensation and damages for a breach of
contract by the Queensland government.
In his ruling Justice Bradley said that the basis
for the equitable compensation claim has
no reasonable prospect of success, "as the
precise conduct the plaintiffs contend was
unconscionable is quite unclear".

As for the claim that the State “has allowed and
permitted other persons to exercise the taxi
licence privileges without requiring that those
persons obtain taxi licences", this relates to two
separate periods.
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