Toronto Police Chief Mark Saunders is full of shit.
There's no ambiguity whatsoever in the laws cited at the end of the linked story. If you're transporting people for a fee, you fall under the auspices of the taxi regulations.
Period.
He is weaseling out of his responsibilities.
The fact that lots of folks like the convenience of Uber should have no bearing on whether or not he instructs his police force to enforce the law.
Sure, lots of folks might like saving a few bucks on a cab fare... how is that a reason to ignore the law?
And who can resist the promise of "making great money for completely flexible hours?" That's the bullshit Uber puts out to lure wannabe unlicensed cabbies into the streets of big cities all over the world.
I'd be thrilled to make great money and have completely flexible hours myself!
That's the fantasy that Uber dangles in front of prospective Uber drivers. They don't spend a lot of time explaining that prospects have to do something illegal in order to make that great money, which generally turns out to be not that great.
So a few sharpies in San Francisco profit big-time from having this stock market play run up its putative value into the multiple billions, some college students get to make the payments on their new Honda Civics, and tens of thousands of mostly immigrant full-time cabbies get to see their livelihoods disappear.
This is happening because people like Toronto's Police Chief Saunders and Mayor John Tory are intimidated by the lawyers that those San Francisco billionaires can unleash on them.
It's got nothing to do with "legal ambiguity."
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