The announcement that Cabify will start VTC licenses after summer after dealing with a battle in court with the Community of Madrid that has lasted years has raised a storm in the sector. First it was the Ministry of Transportation that pointed out that Of the 9,465 he had requested, he has only been granted 773, that is, the 8% of those they had requested with the argument that they did not meet the technical and regulatory requirements. And it made it clear that the allowed authorizations will only serve four years from the date of concession.
But to the sand of the controversy now has jumped now Unauto-VTCthe main employer of the VTC sector willing to ram Cabify. In fact, he has accused her of spreading a “Interested story” On the licenses he requested (in principle 8,500, which have then been 9,446) because “Cabify has fallen far from fulfilling his own expectations.” But in this conflict, Unauto has put himself on the side of the Ministry of Transportation and blames Cabify to hold the regional administration “of her failure to falsely accusing her of changing the criteria in the middle of the process, when the reality is that the established conditions are clear, public and transparent.” And not only that, he accuses the transport company of being “unfair” and “seeking to transfer the difficulties they could have to have not been benefited in their claims.”
The reading that Unauto-VTC makes of the situation is that “Actually, unnecessary growth of the number of authorizations will produce a change of model that, if happens, would seriously harm autonomous, SMEs and large companies as well as workers in the sector and industry and, very specially, consumers and users.”
Although the Ministry directed of land transport, the so -called “Royal Decree Ábalos”.
Unauto-VTC believes that Clear criteria must be set for the sector to grow in an orderly manner And depending on parameters that “go beyond the balance between supply and demand in the Community of Madrid, favoring that the model is sustainable for the taxi and public transport sector.” And after all these statements, the issue with an affirmation settled: “We are not against any company, we defend a model and regulation of mandatory compliance for all, as is done to date.”
However, the statements of Unauto-VTC have scocked in the sector. Some sources consulted suggest that the onslaught has to do with the president of Unauto, José Manuel Berzal, “continues visibly annoying for Cabify’s departure from his organization in 2020, a strategic decision that Uber also shared. Since then, Berzal has multiplied his statements in an attempt to reduce legitimacy to companies that, today, have proven to be much more representative of the new mobility model in Spain ».
At the time, Cabify said he left Unauto precisely because “It did not respond to the general interest of the VTC sector, but to particular interests.” Moreover, he stressed that “he wanted to be represented by a employer with vision, structure and real interlocution capacityand not for what from within many have come to define as a “personalist beach” at the service of a questionable agenda. “
Sector sources have criticized some decisions of Berzal, which have described “irrational” and “alien to the real mobility challenges.” And they put as an example the data of the last National Transport Committee, FENEVAL obtained 55.18% representation compared to 44.82% of UNAUTO, consolidating as the majority entity.