The state government has announced the biggest single release of conventional full-time taxi plates in decades, which will boost the fleet by 15 per cent.
Planning and Infrastructure Minister Alannah MacTiernan said the addition of 185 new taxi licences and a major boost to taxi numbers on the street during peak hours would help improve services for early morning commuters and travellers.
"Increased business travel and the large number of fly-in/fly-out workers in Western Australia is putting a heavy strain on the WA taxi fleet's capacity to meet the demand for on time services during morning peak hours," Ms MacTiernan said.
"As well as creating 185 new full-time taxi lease plates, which is a 15 per cent increase in the full-time fleet, we will allow peak period taxis to operate between 5am and 9am on weekdays in addition to their weekend entitlements.
"We hope that this will add scores of additional taxis to the existing service every morning."
The minister said she had also agreed to a request from the Australian Hotels Association that would make it easier for hotels to operate airport transfer services for their guests.
"Major hotels want to be able to operate small-scale transfer services for their guests, so we are clarifying the rules so that this can happen," she said.
"Allowing more taxis to operate is only one part of the solution; we need more operators and drivers."
Ms MacTiernan said the government would also begin a recruitment campaign to attract more taxi lease operators and drivers to WA.
"WA's unique taxi leasing system creates big opportunities for operators to start their own profitable small business without a major capital investment or capital risk - hard work can bring handsome returns," she said.
"We are going to get the message across to taxi drivers and operators in Melbourne and Sydney that our costs are lower and earnings are good."
