Talk now is of a shortage of cab drivers here in some parts of the UK

"For people crowding back into restaurants, stumbling out of reopened clubs, or heading again to airports, life is getting back to normal. At least that is until they pick up their phone for a taxi, or search a ride-hailing app, in vain. Where have all the cab drivers gone?

"It’s horrendous,” says Steve Farrier, owner of Alpha Cars in Havant, Hampshire. “You can’t get drivers for love or money. You don’t get a break.” He turns the automated booking service off at weekends, “or we couldn’t meet the demand”.

For most of 2020 and 2021, it was customers that were missing, as Covid killed the cab trade. Now firms small and large, from Alpha to Uber, lack drivers at a time when business could boom again.

Many cab drivers who left – for sectors such as retail, which have staff shortages of their own – have little desire to return. Others face long waits for paperwork and tests. And those who stayed can choose the jobs they take, leaving the less lucrative pick-ups stranded.

If a taxi is a luxury for some, it remains a lifeline in rural areas without public transport, for shift workers, those with disabilities, and people out late – particularly women, whose safety has again been put squarely in focus this year."

The Observer