Cabbies shut down airport
by George ‘Mick’ Sweetman

Toronto- June 20th Taxicab and limo drivers working out of Pearson international airport blockaded the highways leading to the airport causing massive traffic jams and delays.

The cabbies were protesting the Greater Toronto Airports Authority practice of only giving taxi licenses to cab companies, which then rent them to drivers for tens of thousands of dollars. The drivers demanded that the licenses be granted to drivers on the basis of seniority (some having worked there for the past 30 years).

The next day the GTAA got a 24-hour court injunction preventing any protests, the decision was appealed and the judge ruled that cabbies had the right to picket the three terminals, as well as the office of the GTAA, but were banned from blocking any roads.

In May, Toronto-based cabbies waged their own series of blockades and protests, including one where they ringed the provincial legislature with a bumper-to-bumper blockade shutting down the busy Queens Park Circle section of University Avenue.

For Toronto cabbies the main issue was the practice of ‘scooping’ fares in the city by airport-based drivers, who by law can pick up fares in Toronto while down-town drivers are banned from picking up fares at the airport.

What is exciting about this upsurge in militancy among cab drivers is that it is organized directly by the drivers themselves, which is exactly the type of struggle that is needed to transform the workers’ movement from its current moribund state into one that can fight for a revolutionary transformation of society.

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This article was from:

Strike!
anarchist news and commentary
coming out of Toronto.
vol.1, issue 1(of this ontario-based edition)
a publication of:
Punching Out, a collective of workers, unionists,'unemployed', & mothers, teachers & students...

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