E-hailing services now regulated - Nancy

Malaysia is the first country to legalise e-hailing services such as Grabcar and Uber, said Minister in the Prime Minister's Department Datuk Seri Nancy Shukri.

The provision to monitor the e-hailing services was made possible following the passing of the Land Public Transport (Amendment) Bill 2017 and the Commercial Vehicles Licencing Board Act (Amendment) Bill 2017 in Dewan Rakyat today.

"This is the first time e-hailing services are regulated...meaning that all eyes are on us now. So far, no other country has implemented monitoring on e-hailing. However, to carry out enforcement on the services, it must first be monitored," she told reporters at the Parliament lobby after the Dewan Rakyat session.

Nancy said, under the bill, e-hailing drivers in the Peninsular were subject to the jurisdiction of the Land Public Transport Commission (SPAD), while the Commercial Vehicles Licencing Board (CVLB) regulated drivers in Sabah and Sarawak.

The bills will enforce similar requirements imposed on taxi drivers to drivers of e-hailing vehicles, which includes health checks, scheduled vehicle inspection, insurance coverage as well as the issuing of driver cards.

Nancy said the service operators were given a grace period of a year to comply with the requirements before enforcement comes into force.

She added that complaints on the e-hailing services, whether from the operators, drivers or users, could be officially directed to SPAD and CVLB.

Earlier, when winding up debate on the Land Public Transport (Amendment) Bill 2017, Nancy said, currently, there was no need for a tribunal to be set up to handle complaints from e-hailing service operators and taxi as proposed by several members of parliament, since the SPAD Complains Department played a similar function.

-- BERNAMA