Eastbourne taxi driver ‘gobsmacked’ at response to buying an electric car

Dean O’Hara, from Sovereign Harbour, has been a driver in Eastbourne for more than 10 years and works for Call A Cab.

When Dean’s estate car needed replacing, he invested in a £25,000 fully-electric MG5 EV.

However, Dean said after making this investment he felt Eastbourne isn’t ready for such a green vehicle despite the borough council promoting an agenda for a greener future.

Dean said, “I was gobsmacked. All this talk of switching away from petrol and diesel but the town’s just not ready. It is all talk and not nearly enough action.”

He said he was told his car couldn’t be licensed because it might ‘set a trend’. He said he was told if 20 Eastbourne taxi drivers went out to buy electric cars there wouldn’t be enough places to charge them.

Dean said he finds it hard to believe that many drivers would make a sudden switch due the cost of electric cars at the moment and therefore the availability of charging points would be fine.

He said, “We have a charging point at home. An eight-hour overnight charge gives me a range of up to 260 miles and that’s more than enough for the work I do - I won’t be clogging up the public charging points.”

Dean said his case was taken up by his local councillors in Sovereign ward who were ‘appalled’ at the way he’s been treated in his efforts to put a sustainable taxi on the roads in Eastbourne.

Sovereign conservative councillor Penny di Cara said, “This is so unfair on a hard-working driver. Dean is now losing money every day because of the total incompetence of our Liberal Democrat-run council. They talk a lot about green issues but, as this woeful case clearly shows, they’ve done precious little to put those mealy words into practice.”

She said, “Like many of us, Dean has a family to support and a mortgage to pay. This is grossly unfair on him when he’s gone out of his way to heed the words of the mandarins running our borough and embrace a more sustainable future for taxi cabs in our town.”

Since raising the issue, Dean said the council has been in touch to tell him the car will be licensed and he said he was also issued an apology for the lack of communication and the amount of time taken to get the issue resolved.