Uber won his appeal after losing his license to operate in London, Bloomberg notes. The judge ruled that the service was fit and proper and that it should be permitted to operate in the capital. The company was given a license to operate for a term of 18 months. Uber was allowed to continue to operate in London throughout the appeals process.
In his opinion, the judge acknowledged that Uber had made historical mistakes. Last year, the London Transport Authority, Transport for London (TfL), cited the history of mistakes as the reason for Uber 's inability to issue a new license to operate. In particular, Uber was criticized for allowing unauthorized drivers to upload their images to other Uber driver accounts, which means that unauthorized drivers might disguise themselves as legitimate.
24 drivers were said to have used this loophole to share their accounts with 20 others, and a total of 14,788 trips are thought to have been made by the wrong driver, BBC News reports. All these journeys were uninsured, and one of the drivers who had been able to take passengers using this form had their license revoked by TfL, the authority said last year.
In his ruling, Deputy Chief Magistrate Tan Ikram said that he claimed that Uber was working to raise its standards. "I am confident that they are doing what a fair company in their sector would be required to do, maybe even more," said the judge, according to Bloomberg.
Uber was given a license to operate for 18 months as part of the decision. This is an improvement over the 15-month temporary license given over Uber back in 2018. More recently, Uber was allowed to operate during the appeals process.
The decision was opposed by the Licensed Taxi Drivers Association, which represents some of the black-cab drivers in London. In a statement posted on Twitter, the decision was called "London Tragedy" and said that Uber had generated a false belief that it had changed for the better.
In recent years , Uber has faced a variety of legal challenges, in particular concerning the job status of its drivers. In California, the company was close to having to shut down in August on an order that would force it to recognize its drivers as workers. The order was eventually blocked by appeal. The decision on the same issue is set to be taken by the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom later this year.
In a statement, Uber called the decision a recognition of Uber's commitment to safety and added that it plans to continue to work constructively with TfL. The company said that there is nothing more critical than the safety of people using the Uber app.
