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SPEED LIMIT IMPACT: Welsh 20mph debate puts taxi drivers’ journey times and earnings in focus
Taxi drivers’ working time and earnings featured in a Senedd debate on 30 September, as Reform UK called for Wales to scrap its default 20mph speed limit.
Conservative MS Janet Finch-Saunders said taxi drivers she had spoken to felt the limit “actually hits their pockets”.
“I get in a taxi now when I get here from Bangor Conwy Môn, and I ask the taxi driver, ‘How does the 20 mph affect you?’ And they hate it,” she told the chamber. “They say it actually hits their pockets. And taxi driving isn’t the easiest job in the world.”
The exchange put a working concern for drivers into a wider argument about the policy’s effects: whether slower journeys reduce the number of jobs a driver can complete, and how that translates into income. The debate transcript gave no figures for taxi journey times, fares, driver earnings or the number of drivers affected.
Reform’s motion, tabled in the name of Llŷr Powell, called on the Welsh Government to scrap the default 20mph limit. Reform speakers argued that the policy added time and cost for road users. Powell said: “Time is money when they’re on the roads. Actual people needing to get from one job to the next to pay their bills, to put food on the table.”
Plaid Cymru MS Sarah Cooper-Lesadd cited Transport for Wales findings that the limit adds about one minute on average per journey. Deputy Minister for Transport Mark Hooper said monitoring found journey-time effects were measured in seconds on many journeys, and that journeys had become more reliable on 45 of the 60 roads monitored. The debate did not provide taxi-specific analysis to show how those figures translate into working time or earnings.
Hooper also acknowledged that some drivers may face slightly longer journeys, while saying the policy had reduced average vehicle speeds on affected roads. He cited a 23% fall in casualties on 20mph and 30mph roads combined compared with 2022. Reform speakers disputed whether the available data proved that the default policy caused the reductions, and called for the Government to publish its updated economic appraisal and set a timetable for its evaluation.
The Government’s amendment proposed that the Senedd note that collisions and casualties had fallen on 20mph and 30mph roads since the policy’s introduction, and recognise local authorities’ progress in changing some limits back to 30mph where appropriate.
Members objected to agreeing the motion without amendment, so the vote was deferred until voting time.
