The Directorate-General of Highway’s (DGH) plan to encourage taxi drivers to become bus drivers has drawn mixed reactions, with industry representatives saying that not too many cab drivers were willing to switch to a well-paid, but less flexible, high-risk job.
The plan was proposed in response to a severe shortage of large bus drivers nationwide. Statistics from the agency showed that the nation has about 3,270 openings for bus drivers, including those for public, freeway and tour buses.
As the average monthly salary for a bus driver is between NT$35,000 and NT$55,000, the agency said it wants to focus on motivating some taxi drivers to seek a career change.
Based on its plan, taxi drivers who are interested in the program would receive up to 50 percent in subsidies for a bus-driving training course, after they have been recruited by bus companies.
Previously, people could qualify to drive tour buses only if they had at least three years of experience in driving large passenger buses.
However, the agency decided to lower the qualification threshold so that drivers of minibuses with at least one year of experience could qualify for the tour-bus drivers licensing test.
Agency Motor Vehicle Division Director Lin Fu-shan (林福山) said that data from motor vehicle offices nationwide showed that there are about 91,000 large bus drivers with valid licenses nationwide. However, just 31,000 are currently driving large buses.
“Many public and freeway bus drivers have provided services on many new bus routes. However, none of them is allowed to cut any unprofitable routes because of the government’s program to improve the public transportation program,” Lin said of factors contributing to the driver shortage.
“Tour bus companies generally have a high turnover rate because of the work conditions, which often involve long hours of driving and operating constantly changing tour routes. The increase in international tourists, which is expected to exceed 9 million this year, also raised the demand for tour buses,” Lin added.
Lin said the training course provided by the DGH would ensure that those interested in becoming tour bus drivers would have the same quality of training as those with three years of experience in driving large buses, though the time to finish the course would take from just three to six months.
Taipei City Professional Drivers’ Union president Cheng Li-chia (鄭力嘉) said that working in a public bus firm requires people to work fixed hours, and the risks of driving a large vehicle also increase.
Few taxi drivers would want to drive large buses, even though such jobs are generally paid well, he said.
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