Campaigns: The Uber Files

More than 124,000 confidential internal Uber documents leaked to the Guardian and shared with other news outlets including BBC Panorama, have shown the full extent of Uber’s lobbying and its efforts to avoid regulation and to circumvent the law in London.

The documents confirm everything that the LTDA and others in the trade have been saying about the Company and its aggressive and sometimes illegal tactics, since it first entered the market.

The leaked files show how the company exerted undue influence over UK government ministers and advisers, including George Osborne, Sajid Javid and Matt Hancock, in off the book meetings and hired close personal friends like Rachel Whetstone and Lynton Crosby to help them gain access to the top levels of the Cameron Government, ultimately preventing the then Mayor of London, Boris Johnson from clamping down on Uber and its damaging operating model.

The LTDA contributed to BBC Panorama’s investigation on the files, Taking us for a ride: The Uber Files, and LTDA General Secretary, Steve McNamara is featured in the programme.

See clip below and more to follow once Panorama airs.

Commenting on the findings Steve McNamara, General Secretary of the Licensed Taxi Drivers Association said:

“The Uber files have demonstrated the lengths that the Company went to protect its damaging, and in many cases illegal, business model. It’s clear from the documents that Uber executives believed that they could make up their own rules, do as they pleased and use their friends in high places to help them get away with it.

“We have been telling people this was happening in London for years. It was an open secret how much power and influence the company was able to exert. Sadly, nothing was ever done to curtail or even question this relentless lobbying and undue influence over policymakers, which undoubtedly prevented Uber from being properly regulated and compromised the safety of the travelling public.

“The people at the top may have changed, but we have no doubt that this culture remains. Some of the executives in question still work for Uber and we would argue that this brings into question the Company’s suitability to be licensed in London and elsewhere. TfL along with regulators and governments across Europe must ensure that Uber and anyone else trying to emulate its so-called disruptive business model, plays by the same rules as everyone else, regardless of who they know or hire to do their bidding for them.”

• Jul 2022

  Watch the video from BBC Breakfast:

  Watch:

  “Watch the video from BBC Breakfast:”

• Jul 2022

  BBC Panorama - 11/07/22

  Watch:

  “BBC Panorama - 11/07/22”

Associated links:

Read the Guardian Article here