Taxi-drivers May Remove Ties

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31113, 16 July 1966, Page 21

Taxi-drivers May Remove Ties

In hot weather Christchurch taxi-drivers will be able to wear open-necked white shirts without ties as a result of an amendment granted by the No. 9 Transport Licensing Authority (Mr J. S. Haywood).

A test case w. s put by Mr P. G. S. Penlington, who appeared for Charles Seymour Trillo, a taxi-driver, who applied for an amendment to his taxi-cab service licence by the deletion of a special condition requiring the wearing of ties and substitution of a condition that a driver is to wear a blue or gold tie according to which organisation he belongs to, with a dispensation granted for the removal of ties in hot weather. Mr Penlington submitted that a driver without a tie could still be clean and tidy and it would not detract from the standard. He said Transport Board bus drivers were allowed to take their ties off when a T was displayed in the window of the board’s office in the

middle of Cathedral square. Taxi-drivers were prepared to use the same sign. The assistant traffic manager for the Christchurch Transport Board (Mr A. W. Savage), said the board used wet and dry bulb thermometers to get the temperature and humidity. According to a line on a chart, the sign allowing drivers to take their ties off was displayed. The district officer of the Transport Department (Mr D. L. Hogan), opposed the amendment on the grounds that the standard of dress would be lowered. He said there was no great hardship in wearing a tie in hot weather. The Christchurch City traffic superintendent (Mr J. F. Thomas) said the Traffic committee had discussed the matter and he had been authorised to say that the committee did not support the amendment He thought the committee might have another look at the matter if taxi-drivers were prepared to submit a full-lress proposal. Transfers Granted Allan Alexander Webster was granted the transfer of a taxi-cab service licence from John Maxwell Gillard and Johann Willielm Oster, and Albert Ross Laing was granted the transfer of a taxicab licence from Harold George O’Neill. Isaac Construction Company, Ltd., was granted an amendment to its goods service licence to allow three vehicles to carry clay, soil, and spoil, and allow a vehicle authority for a fourth bulk tanker and two tanker trailers to carry bulk bitumen in the No. 9 Transport district and Kaikoura County. Desmond Bruce Thiele (Mr J. A. Bretherton), and Waiau Transport, Ltd., (Mr B-etherton), were each granted one additional vehicle authority to carry general goods.