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The past week has been really tough for our taxi and private hire driver brothers and sisters. With the tightened measures such as no dining out, work-from-home as the default and schools switching to home-based learning, the earnings of our drivers have been affected greatly.
I’m glad that the relevant Government agencies took in ground concerns that NTUC, National Taxi Association (NTA) and National Private Hire Vehicles Association (NPHVA) have raised to them. The additional support of higher rate of $25 per day per vehicle through the COVID-19 Driver Relief Fund (CDRF) to the end of June is a relief to our drivers.
Another heartening announcement is the Ministry of National Development, after taking in our drivers' feedback, to extend the grace period for parking to 20 minutes in Housing & Development Board as well as Urban Redevelopment Authority car parks. This will be especially helpful for our delivery riders. We hope this support can be given to our drivers and riders for as long as they need.
Even after the period of Heightened Alert, I foresee that our drivers will still face difficulties in their income streams as there will be a recovery period before things get better. To help our drivers get back on their feet, I’m also happy that the agency has taken in our earlier request and is considering an extension of the CDRF beyond June. We will continue to share ground feedback on this. Other areas that will help our drivers would be for Electronic Road Pricing charges to remain at $0 on arterial roads, including those within the Central Business District.
Even as our drivers are working hard and doing their very best to tide through this difficult period, many drivers are also worried about getting exposed to the virus and infecting their loved ones. To provide additional support to our drivers, both NTA and NPHVA have renewed the short-term relief fund to provide financial support for our members who have been issued with MOH-issued Quarantine Orders. Some of our drivers may also use this period of lower level of ridership to go for training hence training allowance support is another area that we are looking at.
On behalf of my sisters and brothers, we are grateful for the quick and timely support from the Government, taxi and private hire platform operators to continuously support our drivers. As the recovery is expected to be longer than before, we will need to continue working closely together to support our workers, protect their livelihoods and #emergestronger as a community.
Yeo Wan Ling
NTUC Director
Advisor to National Taxi Association and National Private Hire Vehicles Association
