French authorities have been fining UberPOP drivers, although a New York Times report suggested that Uber was paying those fines.
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France passed a law previous year effectively banning Uberpop, the company’s low-priced offering that is akin to UberX in the United States.
In response to the protests, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve issued a statement affirming that, “UberPOP is illegal”, and instructing police to step up enforcement efforts against the company, which up until now had been directed mainly against drivers.
Last week’s protests saw U.S. singer Courtney Love Cobain caught up in the unrest, which she compared with a war zone.
The taxi strike in France last week saw some 3,000 cabbies block access to the capital’s Charles de Gaulle and Orly airports.
“In 2010, the company had to change its original name from UberCab to Uber as taxi companies did not want to create any confusion”.
Prime Minister Manuel Valls condemned the violence and incidents “on both sides” as the government sought to take a tough stand on the protests while backing the drivers’ case. The police started investigating Uber in November 2014 and raided its office in Paris in March 2015.
Uber has naturally argued, as it has in London and other cities, that it should not be punished for its technical innovation and convenience advantage over older cab systems that are unable or unwilling to innovate. “We’re demanding that the Thevenoud law, which clearly forbids unlicensed drivers, be implemented”.
Charges pressed upon them include illegal operations and concealing digital documents.
-In April, an Uber driver with a concealed-carry permit shot a 22-year-old man who had opened fire on a group of pedestrians in Chicago. He also asked prosecutors to begin investigating Uber, and to start impounding the cars of Uberpop drivers, rather than simply fining them.
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Uber has been hit with court injunctions in Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain and France, and has faced protests from taxi firms in numerous major European cities, including London and Brussels. The drivers say that Uber and other ride-sharing services evade the tax, registration and safety laws that regular cabs are subject to.
