Taxi deregulation plan is costing local cabbies their livelihoods

 Have just addressed a rally of the State's taxi drivers outside Parliament House to back them in their fight against proposed government reforms which will leave most of them high and dry.
 The government plans to deregulate the taxi industry following the infiltration into the market of rideshare operators such as Uber.
 That deregulation includes buying back all the taxi plates. Some of those cost local drivers more than $300,000, but the compensation offered to plate owners in the Lake Macquarie and Hunter Region will be a maximum of $55,000. It's just one of many holes in the government's plan.
 The proposed deal is a poor one and I will not back it in its current form.
 I, along with my independent colleagues Alex Greenwich (Sydney), Dr Joe McGirr MP (Wagga Wagga) and Helen Dalton MP (Murray) are working with the government to find a fairer deal, and it'll certainly be one which doesn't destroy the livelihoods of so many of our local cabbies.