Business hasn’t dropped since Uber arrival, taxi driver says

Uber says it has added 10,000 drivers in Australia in the past six months as the controversial ride sharing app continues its push to win over hostile governments.

We are definitely not a “top employer” but we have created 15,000 jobs [in Australia] over the past year.

The San Francisco-based company says it wants to work with officials in Waterloo Region to modernize its regulations. “This is a clear reflection of the demand for flexible, well paid economic opportunities in this country”, David Rohrsheim, Uber general manager in Australia, said in a statement. “That is how they obtain their taxi licenses, and that is how the system is set up now”. An UberX driver is on the road an average of 20 hours each week, the spokesperson said, but stressed there is no typical driver.

Uber finishes by noting there “are now more than 1,000,000 registered Uber riders in Australia” and thanking Australians for their continued support which is “making a difference”.

The firing of the contract drivers is the latest in an ongoing battle between the traditional taxi industry and the disruptive technology of Uber, which lets passengers hail rides in personal cars using their smartphones. In Perth, for example, 27% of drivers predominantly come from suburbs like Gosnells, Girrahween and Hamilton Hill, which have high unemployment rates. Uber also claims 12% of UberX drivers are over 55 years-of-age.

The taxi alliance represents about 360 owner-operators, who drive their own cabs, and another 400 to 500 licensed drivers who are sponsored by taxi companies in the region.

Nearly 150 charges have been laid against drivers accused of operating an Uber since the service launched in Ottawa in October 2014. Now they’re pointing to reports that Uber allowed four people to become drivers in Southern California despite criminal records that allegedly would have stopped them from becoming cabbies.

Though a significant and unusual loss for Uber and its business model, the judgment only applied to the single California driver.