Update 8.30am
PASSENGERS HAVE BEEN greeted by a working taxi service at Dublin Airport this morning.
After a night of discussions between the five representative bodies and DAA, taxi drivers returned to the ranks outside Terminal 1 and Terminal 2 just after 8.15am.
The groups had been in talks in an effort to resolve a dispute over parking spaces which had seen drivers withdraw services from the airport over the past two days.
Up to 200 taxi drivers were expected for a protest at the airport today but proposals tabled by the unions and airport officials were agreed at about 6.30am. Representatives recommended the deal to drivers, who accepted it within the last hour.
Discussions between airport officials and unions went on through the night after beginning at 5.30pm yesterday.
Agreement
A spokesperson for DAA told TheJournal.ie that the 55 parking spaces at the centre of the dispute will be handed back to taxi drivers for two weeks. However, after that 14-day moratorium, the spaces will be taken back for their new use.
Intensive negotiations between airport officials and taxi drivers’ representatives will take place during those two weeks on the wider issue of taxi queuing at the airport.
The deal has made it clear that there will be no extension of the moratorium and “whatever happens” those 55 spaces will be taken back on 7 September.
DAA has previously maintained that there is enough capacity for taxi permit holders at the airport.
David McGuinness from Tacsaí Timonaí na hEireann said the drivers are happy with the agreement reached. “There were no dissenting voices,” he said, “and it’s all back to work.”
The group’s representative said that the parking spaces at the centre of the dispute aren’t the “holy grail” but that its members just want the airport to provide “proper facilities” so taxi drivers can do their work.
An ideal scenario at the end of the two week negotiation period would be that “everyone who pays for a permit would be able to queue without fear of fines, penalty points or being moved on by Gardaí or airport police”.
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