The Supreme Court has once again upheld an appeal presented by Maxi Mobility, a subsidiary of Cabify, against the denial by the Community of Madrid of a request processed in 2018 to obtain 1,000 VTC authorisations, ordering that the process be opened again.
This ruling reproduces a similar one published a week ago, which ruled in the same way about another 1,000 licences, so these judicial resolutions open the door for Cabify to add another 2,000 VTC licences in the Community of Madrid.
The authorisations were requested by Cabify on April 20, 2018, just one day before the Government of Mariano Rajoy brought into force a decree that limited the VTC ratio to only one for each 30 taxis.
According to the National Taxi Association (Antaxi), that day up to 25,000 VTC licences were requested in the Community of Madrid, so the number of authorisations that will finally have to be reviewed could continue to increase if the Supreme Court maintains its criteria in other similar judicial processes.
However, the current Government approved a law in June last year to grant autonomous communities and city councils a series of tools to limit the authorisations of VTC licences based on environmental reasons and traffic management in cities, after the European justice would overthrow the 1/30 ratio but leave the door open to restrict new licences for these two reasons.
That is, if in 2018 the Community of Madrid denied VTC requests applying the 1/30 criterion, now it could do so arguing that it will mean more vehicles on the streets or more pollution. However, the region chaired by Isabel Díaz Ayuso has been characterised by developing more lax laws for VTCs, compared to the more restrictive ones such as the Catalan ones, unless it is forced to restrict its activity due to pressures from the taxi sector.
According to the latest data from the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility, in the Community of Madrid there are 15,363 taxi authorisations and 8,893 VTC, in Catalonia 12,361 taxi and 3,219 VTC authorisations. In the country as a whole, there are 60,983 taxis and 19,093 VTCs.
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