Deregulating taxi services

Sir, - It is surely unacceptable that when successive governments have interfered in and distorted a market over many years and…

Sir, - It is surely unacceptable that when successive governments have interfered in and distorted a market over many years and created false values as a result, the participants in that market should be expected to bear financial losses resulting directly from a change in government policy.

We would do well to remember here that the alternative to the entrepreneurship of those who did invest in taxi plates was to have had no taxi service. We should also recognise the invalidity of drawing comparisons between losses resulting from competition between citizens, (e.g. the local greengrocer being undermined by the arrival of a supermarket), and losses resulting from the exercise of the enormous powers of government over citizens. - Yours, etc.,

Paul Feighery, Torquay Road, Dublin 18.