Pay up or walk: Quaden just wanted a cab but drivers refused to take him

Taxi drivers refusing fares and behaving inappropriately, combined with an ineffective complaints system, has made catching cabs a fraught and dispiriting experience for people with disabilities.

Prominent Australians with disabilities including Mad Max actor Quaden Bayles and former discrimination commissioner Graeme Innes have told this masthead about their bad taxi experiences, including frequent refusals, and called for immediate changes to the system.

Quaden Bayles, who was told to pay an exorbitant fare or walk.Credit: Ben Symons

Quaden’s mother, Yarraka Bayles, said she and her son, who has achondroplasia, a form of dwarfism, had needed to make a trip to shops near their Melbourne hotel in 2022.

Bayles said she usually used Uber but there was a taxi rank outside the hotel so they tried to get a cab until the driver demanded $40 upfront.

“He looked at us up and down ... it wasn’t a nice way,” she said. “He started laughing, and we just walked away, and he stuck his finger up at us. Quaden lip-reads because he’s hearing impaired … and he said, ‘Mum, he’s swearing’.”

She said two more drivers waiting at the rank demanded the same outsized fare, and one told her to walk. She said she tried to explain her son had a disability, and could not walk that far.

“We were just met with so much disrespect. And broad daylight Melbourne, peak hour … it was public humiliation at the same time. To go to the third cab driver, and him do the same thing, I was livid,” she said.

The claims come after this masthead and 60 Minutes revealed a taxi driver, who systematically defrauded and repeatedly assaulted his passengers with profound disabilities, was discovered by authorities only after he was arrested for drink-driving on the job.

The major investigation revealed widespread fraud within the nation’s biggest taxi company, A2B – owner of 13cabs, Silver Service and Cabcharge – spurring calls to overhaul the sector from police, politicians, the judiciary and the nation’s leading disability and consumer rights advocates.

The taxis involved in Bayles’ incident were from a variety of companies. Bayles complained to the Human Rights Commission, represented by the National Justice Project, on the basis of racial and disability discrimination, but ultimately abandoned the case earlier this month judging it was unlikely to succeed.

“Pretty much fighting for justice the last two years, only to come up against so many roadblocks, it just seems impossible to hold taxi drivers accountable,” she said. “There’s so many legal loopholes and just cracks that they fall through.”

She said her son had already been traumatised when a taxi driver accused him of faking his disability and fare evading in 2018.

“[The driver] rang back to base, and he said, there’s people in the taxi evading a fare,” she said. “He said … he can walk. That’s not a wheelchair.”

Bayles said Quaden was recovering from surgery at the time and could walk short distances but still relied on mobility aids.

Quaden, who shot to national prominence after being bullied as a younger child, now had “major anxiety around taxis”, she said.

National Justice Project chief executive and director George Newhouse said taxi companies were intentionally shirking their duties to consumers by arguing drivers were responsible.

“They hide behind laws that treat each driver as an independent contractor … even when an event happens in a taxi covered in the taxi company’s name and brand such as 13cabs or Silvertop,” he said.

“They make grandiose claims about their service but then don’t take any responsibility for their drivers or the harm that is done in the cab company’s name.”

Writer and disability activist Carly Findlay went to the Human Rights Commission in 2013 after three different taxi drivers discriminated against her within a year, and has campaigned on the issue since making 20 official complaints.

Speaker and activist Carly Findlay says the taxi industry has made no progress in 12 years.Credit: Justin McManus

Findlay, who has ichthyosis, a genetic skin condition that causes scaly, red skin, said the company in her commission complaint, 13cabs, agreed to film a training video for drivers after the case went to mediation, but nothing had changed.

“The last time was pretty awful,” Findlay said. “[The driver] said that he was too scared that my face would ruin his car. He said that I smell and that my face is offensive.

“It’s exhausting ... I feel like, no matter how much we do education-wise, it just continues because they’re not receiving any penalties or any kind of ramifications for behaving this way. There needs to be mandatory training, but also mandatory banning.”

She said the effects on people with disabilities were profound, and she had had major life events marred because of a taxi refusal, including after her book launch and on her birthday.

“We still have places to be. And the taxi drivers, the taxi company, the government ... they don’t respect that,” she said. “It feels really unsafe to be in a car when someone’s questioning your appearance or making derogatory comments about you.”

Findlay said she now relied on Uber.

Company director and former Australian disability discrimination commissioner Graeme Innes, who is blind, said he was refused service by three cab drivers in a row in January because of his guide dog.

Graeme Innes, with his guide dog, says taxis too often refuse people with assistance animals.Credit: Paul Harris

It was the second time multiple drivers had refused him in quick succession while he was visiting Melbourne from his home in Tweed Heads, though taxis are legally required to accept passengers with service animals.

Innes said though it was an issue everywhere, Melbourne was known as the “guide dog refusal capital of Australia”.

“This is endemic in Victoria,” he said, pointing to a pending court case being run by an Uber customer.

“I was probably an hour late for my next meeting as a result. But this has more of an impact on less-empowered people. It’s devastating … I know a lot of other blind people who just choose not to go out or not to go out as often.”

He said the response from cab companies and regulators was unacceptable.

“Neither of them are interested in this ... They talk a good game, but it’s not an issue for them. They don’t care about the events occurring, and don’t care much about the people to whom it’s happening,” he said.

“I’d like to see the regulator take some action. Awareness doesn’t cut it. It’s not that people aren’t aware. It’s that people choose to break the law.”

Consumers’ Federation of Australia chairman Gareth Downing said the problems were well documented.

“There’s been a huge number of issues with trying to get a taxi if you have a guide dog. It’s very, very hard,” Downing said.

A 13cabs spokesperson said the company had significantly improved its disability services recently, and regularly exceeded the required standards in state government audits.

The spokesperson said in a statement that 13cabs drivers were extensively trained and had to abide by a code of conduct or face disciplinary action or removal from its network.

“Unfortunately, under current industry regulations, they are free to work for other taxi or rideshare networks,” the statement said.

“That is why we continue to push for stronger governance and accountability across the sector.”

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