Community Transport Association (CTA) CEO Bill Freeman has defended the sector from allegations that its drivers do not meet high standards.
Speaking on BBC Radio Humberside on 29 September, Mr Freeman said that community transport is “a uniquely British thing that the European Community does not understand, and never will.”
He was quizzed after Holderness Area Rural Transport, a community transport organisation (CTO), said that the sector in East Yorkshire could cease to exist if the Department for Transport enforces EC Regulation 1071/2009.
“Permits are a form of regulation. CTOs have to comply with roadworthiness requirements and their drivers must be trained,” says Mr Freeman. He adds that MIDAS training is better than the statutory requirements that the sector could be forced to adopt.
“Drivers have proved that they are competent to drive a minibus, which is not what would happen in the statutory system that we may be forced to comply with.”
Mr Freeman adds that if CTOs are forced to obtain an O-Licence and drivers are obliged to hold unrestricted category D1 entitlement, the burden on the public purse will be huge. “The needs of the vulnerable must come first,” he says.
“The regulations that are being imposed are designed to manage competition for local authority contracts. That is a long way away from a conversation about how we create the kind of transport that people need in communities.”
