Aussie News: Culture shock for untrained cabbies

CABBIES must have good English but they also need cultural training so they can deal with difficult and dangerous situations, a report says.

Muslim drivers have been known to refuse to accept cash handed over from female passengers unless the money is put on the seat.

Other reported cases include migrant drivers feeling threatened because they don't understand Australian humour and being embarrassed when women offer to pay their fares with sex.

Growing concern by taxi operators and governments over the poor English skills of drivers led to Queensland firm ISLPR Language Services being commissioned to develop national minimum standards for the industry.

The company's report, How Good Should a Taxi Driver's English Be? was presented on Thursday at a Melbourne University conference hosted by the Language Testing Research Centre.

Report co-author Prof David Ingram said that many drivers had problems communicating on an everyday basis and this could mean trouble in stressful situations.

"It requires high levels of English proficiency to deal with drunken and aggressive passengers," he said. "But if you set the levels too high you will have an adverse effect on recruitment."

The Herald Sun picked five questions from the year 7 NAPLAN literacy test and quizzed migrant drivers on their English knowledge.

Of the 15 cabbies tested, six got two questions right, six got three right and one got four correct. No one got all of them right and two drivers gave up after briefly studying the questions.

Driver Aravind Pindi, 30, of Sunshine, said that about 60 per cent of his colleagues spoke good English and Indians often had an advantage over other migrants because they had learnt English from a young age.

" It takes time for everyone to get used to this language," he said.

Another driver, who got two questions right, said he was attending English classes and wanted to improve.

"Taxi drivers are dumb. That's why we are taxi drivers," he said.

Prof Ingram, an honorary professorial fellow at Melbourne University, said that cultural clashes such as refusing to carry guide dogs showed that language was not the only issue.

"You can't just teach that or talk about that," he said.

"You've got to let people get into a situation where they can experience it."

Report co-author Elaine Wylie said passengers were being insensitive to drivers from certain backgrounds when they used sexual come-ons.

My News:

There is a growing concern about the poor English level of the taxi driver in Australia. Many cases which involve the miscommunication between passengers and taxi driver have happened. These include some migrant cabbies get threatened with the humors that spoke by the passenger and felt awkward when some female passengers offered for sex to pay for the rates. Other than that, there is a culture shock among the migrant driver. Muslims are known for their reluctance to receive money from female passenger unless they put the money on the seat. This draws the attention of taxi operators and governments and Queensland firm ISLPR Language Services are given authority to increase the minimum English level of taxi driver in Australia.