Government passed legislation making global positioning systems mandatory in all Island taxis last night after a fiery debate.

The bill has been the target of the ten-day taxi strike as well as years of verbal protests from cabbies.

Immediately after the vote drivers called off their strike and took to the streets to work the heavy Friday night shift.

Government say the GPS, which tracks cabs? positions and dispatches the nearest one to the job, will improve response time.

But drivers have protested the cost ? estimated to be between $1,500 and $3,000 per cab ? as well as the intrusiveness of the system.

The measure was first considered in June 2002 and passed despite the objections of the Opposition and ruling party whip Ottiwell Simmons but was then rejected by the Senate.

Last night the Opposition tried to amend the Motor Car Amendment (No. 2) Act by giving drivers other options alongside GPS such as two-way radios, mobile data terminals and alarm devices but the motion was defeated 18 to 13.

Government backbenchers Ottiwell Simmons abstained saying the Speaker had ruled he could not vote while Progressive Labour Party colleague George Scott was absent from the chamber.

After the vote Transport Minister Ewart Brown said this was because both had declared an interest ? Mr. Simmons owns a taxi and Mr. Scott has an interest in one of the GPS companies.

Dr. Brown said the bill, if it passes the Senate, will come into force in January and drivers would be given six months from then to get their cabs fitted with GPS.

He said he was cautiously optimistic the Senate would pass the bill.

The UBP had argued the system should not be mandatory if it would improve business and claimed that placing a monitor in a cab could be dangerous as drivers? attention would be split.

Introducing the bill yesterday Transport Minister Ewart Brown said his remarks would be brief since there had been a full debate in 2002 as well as a few weeks earlier, but that he wanted to review issues that had not received much Press as well as to address myths regarding the legislation.

After mentioning the benefits of digital dispatch and GPS, Dr. Brown highlighted the inefficiencies of the current manual system of dispatch where calls are recorded on slips of paper which may not be addressed for at least 15 minutes, stating: ?This is the real bottleneck in the taxi industry.?

And he added that the industry must work to restore the faith of their customers.

?The customer is the really important cog in this wheel ? the customer is the person we have to keep satisfied,? he said.

Dr. Brown also addressed misinformation from those suggesting that he would personally profit from installation of the system.

He emphasised that he had no personal interest in the companies offering the equipment.

He said although some believe Government wanted the new legislation to know the location of any taxi at any given moment, it simply was not true.

?We support this legislation because it will result in better services and for the first time we will be able to collect data needed to regulate the industry,? he said, noting that the new technology would allow taxis to travel fewer miles without a paying passenger.

He also said that drivers who claim they know where to find work and make a single circuit from the cruise ships to the hotels to the airport lose out on hundreds of Bermudian customers.

Dr. Brown revealed a poll of 400 Bermudians taken in June which showed 69 percent wanted a computerised taxi dispatching service while 84 percent wanted additional taxi permits to be made available.

Premier Alex Scott said the issue was one of principle for the Government. He said: ?The industry is sick, not the individuals, it?s dysfunctional.?

He said there were 600 cabs in Bermuda, 66 per parish and 28 per square mile yet it was still difficult to get a cab.

He said people had to set their calendar rather than their watch on when they would come.

Government had tried everything to persuade drivers said Mr. Scott including offering equity in the industry and dispatching companies, as well free first year use of the equipment.

?Maybe we should have thrown in a trip to Vegas.?

He said of the GPS bill: ?It wasn?t vindictive, it was for the country.?

Shadow Transport Minister Jamahl Simmons responded to Dr. Brown?s comments by stating that the drivers? concerns about the bill were not the result of the costs or resistance to technology, but rather the result of a lack of trust.

Mr. Simmons questioned Government?s motivation for insisting on the legislation, and called the $40,000 education campaign about the Bill ?utter rubbish and a waste of money? ? a statement which caused Dr. Brown to call for a point of order on the grounds that Mr. Simmons was impugning the motives of the Government.

Mr. Simmons added that, had Government offered a pilot programme, it would have allowed taxi owners to make an informed business decision about whether this was the best way forward.

He noted that the proposed fare increases had not initially been linked to GPS, and criticised Government for ?nefarious behaviour? in subsequently linking the two ? although Dr. Brown interrupted Mr. Simmons to remind him that the decision to make the bill comprehensive was made many months ago.

Mr. Simmons called on Government to withdraw the legislation as a way of re-establishing trust, adding ?for an industry based primarily in the working class, to feel forced and betrayed by a Labour Government is a crime.?

He said the ?political and emotional costs? of the bill were not worth it, especially for an untried system. And Mr. Simmons warned against possible repercussions if the four dispatch companies later merged into a single company, creating a monopoly.

Mr. Simmons closed by making an appeal to Government backbenchers to support the Opposition?s stance on the Bill.

Shadow Minister of Labour, Home Affairs and Public Safety Maxwell Burgess said a deceitful, treacherous woman stood between the taxi industry and Government named ?Miss Trust?.

He said: ?Miss Trust says to the taxi owners, we?ll put GPS in the cars for free, but you?ll pay after you get the money ? and I?ve never understood which part of free you pay for.?

Mr. Burgess said he admired the entrepreneurial spirit of the taxi drivers who turned to construction or fishing to supplement their income to feed their families rather than expecting to be subsidised by Government.

He said if Government was going to insist on enforcing the 16-hour daily use requirement, then more needed to be done to protect against damage and loss of revenue. Mr. Burgess proposed a dual licence system for eight-hour cabs and 16-hour cabs.

And he said, in regards to GPS, it was not the radio dispatcher?s business to know where an individual cab was.

Mr. Burgess added that Government had a ?moral obligation? to use all the available resources to come to a fair conclusion ?before bringing out the guns?.

Dr. Brown called for a point of order, and stated: ?It?s not our interest to track where a car is ? it?s important that bit of information be understood, even if it?s not believed.?

But Mr. Burgess said he would not be surprised if the effects of the night?s vote were felt since some drivers might not be able to go to work the next day ?like nothing happened?.

He said now was an opportunity for Government to show real leadership, and said Government should form a Cabinet committee to look at the issues besetting the industry.

Shadow Minister of Works and Engineering Patricia Gordon Pamplin said the PLP backbenchers had no stiffness of spine, and were unlikely to cross the line and support the UBP to stop the legislation.

?The modus operandi of PLP has been pointed out to us ? in terms of approach to certain issues, or this particular issue,? she said.

?We acknowledge the PLP knew most Bermudians are not in favour of this particular issue. Many who are opposed (to GPS) supported the PLP. But the party (PLP) has made the decision to play down the issue,? she said.

Ms Gordon Pamplin said the PLP said ?the people did not know what was good for them?.

Finance Minister Paula Cox said that Ms Gordon-Pamplin was misleading the House, by trying to say that the PLP had a ?lack of integrity and was duplicitous?, Minister Cox said.

?But Mr. Speaker, you are aware that we have the fortitude to take up issues, like the employment law,? Ms Cox said.

Ms Cox said the Government ?did not shirk issues? and can compromise, like the ?mediation with the educators?.

Ms Gordon Pamplin continued to say that the result ?we had today was of a taxi industry who do not feel are represented?.

She said she heard Dr. Brown say that ?GPS was important for the improvement of service ... and that it was not guaranteed to make money but will save money?.

?Additional costs will be imposed on taxi drivers and owners to pay for the technology that Government is imposing on them,? she said.

?What the drivers are asking Government for is for them to express a degree of reasonableness.?

On a point of order, Dr. Brown said in 1979 crash helmets were made mandatory by the UBP and at that time Mr. Astwood was the Speaker of the House.

?A few hours after the bill was passed he found himself as a principal in the company selling the most helmets,? Dr. Brown said.

But Ms Gordon Pamplin said she did not mind if it was ?UBP, PLP or green split pea? but when ?a business plan is put forward? it should be a ?sound business plan?, she said.

Ms Gordon Pamplin asked why there was not a ?pilot system on hand first?, and said that there was a distinct difference between ?public transportation and a public transportation vehicle?.

She also said that the Government had ample time to change the rule that taxis must be on the road for 16 hours a day ? if they deemed it inappropriate.

She asked Government where were the statistics that said that taxi service had dropped.

?Do not make business owners pay for (Government?s) lack of information,? she said.

Ms Gordon Pamplin wondered that if several companies were allowed to sell the GPS systems, what would prevent them from merging together and ?fleecing the owners ... in a monopolistic situation?.

She said she thought ?it was important to point out that (taxi drivers) were forced to dig into their pockets, when additional returns were not guaranteed.?

She asked ?why it was mandatory??

?If four taxi drivers were in a conversation and two say to the other they got the technology and made $1,000 a week and the other two said they made $50? after expenses, the GPS would ?drive itself? she said.

She said ?we have a crab-in-a-barrel mentality... People say want to catch up with you ... if the technology is so great it will sell itself.?

She said that an alarm button would not be ?a panacea for the safety of every driver?.

She also said that she did not believe that the taxi drivers ?willingly? wanted to hold back their services ?at the height of the tourist season? but that they were ?standing on principle?.

And that she ?supported the issue of standing on principle.?

She said the taxi drivers had been ?driven against a wall? and that it had happened under a PLP Government.

At this a member of the public in the gallery of the House of Assembly said ?not for long?.

In an impassioned speech calling for moderation, former cab driver Ashfield DeVent, who is now Works and Engineering and Housing Minister, said change had always been resisted but eventually proved its worth.

He said his cab driving grandfather had resisted the radio while his father had resisted a cell phone in the cab but Mr. DeVent said the cell had stopped him missing fares because of the favouritism of dispatchers.

He said the Bermuda Hotel Association and the Hotel section of the Chamber of Commerce were expressing concern about taxi service.

In the back of town he said people had given up on getting taxis and he said some drivers admitted they wouldn?t go there or even pick up locals.

?There?s been successive calls for change in the taxi industry but someone now has the fortitude to do something. If we stayed stuck, we would still be in chariots ? we must move on.?

New York cabbies had recently been forced to get GPS in return for fare increases and Canadian cabbies who had opposed the scheme now love it, said Mr. DeVent.

Businessmen, tourists and locals demanded an efficient service, he said.

?If this is not the answer I have still to hear anything from the other side which will make it better.?

Cabs must be on the road 16 hours a day by law. Mr. DeVent said: ?The other side say police it. We know we will have to go all over the place searching for taxis, from construction sites to golf courses, let?s be honest about this.?

He said those who did their job properly had nothing to worry about but the others who let the public down faced being found out.

Forcing technology on drivers was nothing new said Mr. DeVent as the old UBP government had made radios mandatory in the 1970s. ?All this is, is the new radio.?

Mr. DeVent said three times he had been forced to sleep on floors of hosts after being unable to get a cab home after dinner dates.

And, on two of these occasions, he had been promised a cab after finally getting through to the dispatcher ? only to find the cabs didn?t come then.

When he called again the dispatcher had no record of the original call.

?Now we are talking about something a lot easier, a lot more efficient.?

Opposition Tourism spokesman David Dodwell said he wasn?t opposed to GPS but said it risked undoing the good work of Dr. Brown in bringing in more tourists to the island.

He said the confrontational approach had made everyone unhappy ? Government, drivers, tourists and other passengers.

He said: ?I am not opposed to GPS, I believe people still support it.? But he said cramming it down drivers? throats was not the answer.

?We have to find a way to get taxis on the road, GPS may be the way to do it. If you force them kicking and screaming you won?t produce ambassadors.?

Home Affairs Minister Randy Horton said: ?People are not getting the kind of service they deserve from the taxi industry.?

His party was being bold in dealing with the problems said Mr. Horton. ?We are not going to buckle at the knees.?

Opposition leader Grant Gibbons said Government claimed to be instigating ?tough love? but it was really a case of ?tough luck?. He too said it wasn?t about the technology itself but the compulsion aspect of forcing people to accept GPS.

?GPS won?t solve the issues or get a taxi down to St. David?s at 11 o?clock at night or get someone to pick up someone in the back of town.

?If you scorch the earth so badly you won?t get the co-operation required to deal with the issues here.?

He said Government was saying it needed the technology to get data on the industry, in which case it should fund the technology itself.

Then Government was arguing the technology would make the industry more efficient.

If this was the case argued Dr. Gibbons, then Government should not force GPS on drivers because it was a business decision for them whether they believed the investment would pay off.

?There is very little to be gained in pushing forward. You will get a complete lack of co-operation.?

If GPS was that good taxi drivers would opt to buy it anyway argued Dr. Gibbons. To which Dr. Brown replied: ?Why did you ram radios through then??

Coverage of the GPS debate and other Parliament matters will continue in Monday?s The Royal Gazette.