Face Off: Should Hong Kong create stricter rules for ride-hailing services?
Two students debate on ride-hailing services, touching on the advantages of safety and regulation versus convenience and competition
Should Hong Kong create stricter rules for its ride-hailing services? Photo: Jelly TseEach week, two readers discuss a hot topic in a parliamentary-style debate that doesn’t necessarily reflect their personal viewpoints.
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For: Cherry Chan, 14, St Mary’s Canossian College
The unchecked operations of ride-hailing services pose a significant threat to public safety and the established taxi industry. If ride-hailing cabs are to be considered on par with traditional taxi services, it is imperative that drivers shoulder similar responsibilities.
Ensuring the proper licensing of drivers is to ensure the safety of passengers. The government should be the ones to conduct background and driving record checks of drivers for ride-hailing apps in case they have a suspicious record.
Aside from suspicious backgrounds, the law also controls drivers’ behaviour. Road traffic regulations indicate how a taxi driver should behave – not to cherry-pick their customers, act in a civil and orderly manner, and most importantly, take all reasonable precautions to ensure the safety of their passengers.
Drivers’ manner of behaving directly affects the well-being of passengers, and ride-hailing services currently have none of these laws to guarantee the most comfortable service.
Traditional taxi services are bound by strict geographical restrictions when picking up and dropping off customers. They must adhere to rigorous vehicle safety standards just to obtain a licence.
The absence of such restrictions for ride-hailing services gives them a significant and unfair advantage, which is detrimental to the survival of traditional taxi services.
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Moreover, taxis are burdened with taxes and fees, creating a substantial cost disadvantage. Maintaining a level playing field is crucial, as this is the livelihood of thousands of taxi drivers who have families to support. Ignoring their financial needs is not just unfair, but also inhumane.
As services that are essentially the same, it is only fair that they bear the same responsibilities.
While additional rules and regulations may impact the growth of such services, protecting the safety of the general public and ensuring the competitiveness of taxi drivers should take precedence.
Rules should not be seen as a hindrance, but as a safeguard for safety and the equilibrium of society.
Against: Hayden Chan, 16, Ying Wa College
Ride-hailing has become a new way for people to commute. By just opening an app, people can hire a driver for themselves and freely travel from place to place. This is why it is gaining more public acceptance day by day. However, some critics have posed concerns about how ride-hailing raises safety and competition issues, demanding more regulations.
There is no denying that in Hong Kong, it is illegal for drivers of private vehicles to accept paid customers without a permit. But that does not lead to any safety issues. All drivers working under ride-hailing platforms must own a driving licence. That means every driver has undergone proper examination before they can officially drive their vehicle. Safety is ensured for both drivers and riders. Uber serves over 70 nations globally. In the US, more than 99.9 per cent of its rides ended without any safety incidents in 2019 and 2020.
Many taxi drivers also complained about losing customers after ride-hailing services joined the industry a few years ago. Nevertheless, according to a 2014 study, when Uber started its operations in Hong Kong, most of the citizens switched to ride-hailing services mainly because of the poor quality of service in taxis. A unilateral ban on ride-hailing platforms creates unequal competition between both sectors.
On the other hand, cab drivers are responsible for renovating and revamping their services and moving with the times to expand their business.
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For instance, the establishment of online platforms like FlyTaxi and HKTaxi perfectly blends ride-hailing and taxi services. Therefore, the authorities should not tighten their rules on them to foster healthy competition.
Despite all the one-sided and biased punishments imposed on them, ride-hailing still prevails over taxis in terms of the quality of service. Take Uber, for example; they have a two-way rating system for customers and drivers. This spurs drivers to give quality rides.
If authorities pass the proposal for more restrictions, all services must be halted before 2025 unless further permits are issued. Violators will have their driving licences suspended and vehicles impounded, meaning they cannot work for a living and lose their jobs. In terms of creating fair competition, Hong Kong should refrain from tightening its rules for ride-hailing services and issue more permits to qualified drivers in the future instead.