Sinanan: 650 maxi-taxi owners get fuel cheques so far

SOME 650 maxi-taxi owners, whose earnings have been curtailed during the covid19 pandemic, have been given fuel support grant cheques, Minister of Works and Transport Rohan Sinanan told the House of Representatives Standing Finance Committee on Wednesday.

Due to the need for physical distancing, for several weeks maxi-taxis had been limited to carrying 50 per cent of their usual passenger capacity.

Sinanan said 1,150 owners had so far applied and were now at various stages of being processed.

Tabaquite MP Dr Surujrattan Rambachan contrasted the number of applicants to the 5,000 maxi-taxis being registered which, he said, was an uptake rate of just 23 per cent. Sinanan replied new applications are received by his ministry on a daily basis. He lamented some applicants were double dipping, while others claimed compensation for vehicles that had not worked in three years.

Rambachan asked about any claims by owners of fleets of maxis who hired other men as drivers. Saying he had not come across any such instances, he said such individuals were not the intended beneficiaries of the compensation cheques.

Mayaro MP Rushton Paray asked if car taxi drivers would also be compensated. Sinanan said his ministry is now in consultation with various taxi associations, but these drivers were less organised than their maxi-taxi peers. “Their grant is $750.” He justified this sum for a four-seat taxi, being less than the $2,000 given for a 25-seat maxi-taxi.

Couva South MP Rudranath Indarsingh asked if drivers of private school buses would be compensated. Sinanan replied that if such drivers had been parked up during the pandemic (during which schools have been shut), they were not using fuel and so did not need a fuel grant.

“And you are also allowed to access all the other grants at the Ministry of Social Development.”