CAB and taxi . . . Has there been anything over the years about which the use of a three-letter word instead of a four-letter word has caused more rows, letters to the editor of this newspaper, headaches for what used to be called the Motor Traffic Office and total confusion for the majority of those wanting simply to get home from the pub, a night out or a wet and windy shopping trip to the metropolis?

Then, almost without anyone noticing – probably because the majority of us were fed up with being told that the difference between a taxi and a cab was that a taxi operates from public ranks and the harbours and Airport (when convenient) while cabs operate from depots and are usually booked by telephone – it all went quiet, and those of us who had followed this saga for what seemed like half a lifetime thought that peace had finally broken out.

And so it had, until what is fast becoming yet another entity, like counsellors and personnel departments – which, if they actually do have a useful function other than self-perpetuation have managed very successfully to conceal it – stuck in its unwelcome oar in yet another display of jobsworth self-importance.

Unlike, I suspect, those whose task it is to carry out young Philip Ozouf’s diktat that all competition must be good – namely, the occupants of the Jersey Competition and Regulatory Authority’s offices – I am old enough to remember much of the mayhem before the Jersey Cab Drivers Association decided that it was in everyone’s best interests to promote uniformity in its fares so that the public knew that there existed a measure of protection from being ripped off.

Indeed, I can well recall my parents arguing the toss over the relative merits of Beeline, Streamline and Luxicabs, with my old granny sticking in her tuppenceworth by suggesting that there was a place in Gloucester Street called Radio Cabs which was the quickest because they had two-way wirelesses in their cars and so with a bit of luck there would be one just around the corner when you phoned.

The problem then, and this continued until not that long ago, was that unlike the taxis which operated from the ranks, where what they charged had to be approved by that lot in the Big House, the vehicles which operated from depots could charge what they liked – and they very often did, with the resultant bad publicity making life difficult for the operators who tried to ensure that punters were charged the same, no matter which firm or one-man band was used.

Then, no sooner had the travelling public got what they wanted than along came the Jersey Competition Regulatory Authority to tell cab drivers that they were under investigation for price-fixing. And now it has turned out – and this is no surprise to anyone who’s been here more than ten minutes – that the JCRA executive director finds out that the successor to what used to be the Motor Traffic Office ‘colluded’ in the price-fixing by printing and distributing a scale of fees agreed by the four major cab companies; something which he finds ‘worrying’.

I tell you what, pal, I reckon that the pressure you put the cab companies under – what sanctions were they threatened with, I wonder? – is far more worrying for me than the fact that all cab drivers were charging identical amounts for identical journeys.

I certainly don’t want to be in a position where I take Herself out for a meal and find that the cost of a cab home can vary between the ten quid which used to be on the meter – there for everyone to see – and the sky’s-the-limit amount that some less scrupulous drivers will start demanding as a result of an idiotic ‘agreement’ which was clearly reached under duress.

The JCRA executive director, one Chuck Webb, is quoted as saying that he hoped that the end result would be cheaper fares for cab users. If Mr Webb had only bothered to look at the history of what led to the uniformity he has now forced the cab companies to ditch, he might well have been persuaded to leave well alone.

There again, if you occupy the mindset that all competition, no matter what, is by definition beneficial to consumers then you will flex your little muscles, stick out your chest like a bantam cockerel, strut about full of your own importance and convince yourself, your cohorts, and like-minded politicians who themselves can never, ever acknowledge that they are wrong about anything, that you are right then leaving well alone does not enter the equation.

Of course, the fact that this nonsense is more likely than not to cost the travelling public more money rather than less was graphically illustrated by cab driver Sean Crick’s recent letter in which he pointed out – the obvious in my view – that the JCRA’s intervention in this is simply opening a can of worms in which the greedy will exploit the public.

Mr Webb, Senator Ozouf and other worshippers at the Altar of the Church of Competition will no doubt tell those who feel exploited to shop around. My immediate reaction would be to tell those stuck in driving rain outside their local after chucking out time arguing with a greedy cab driver that thirty quid is too much for a lift home to ring Mr Webb or Senator Ozouf and ask for suggestions as to where else they should shop.

And to think, the JCRA is the outfit that professes to hold sway over whether Royal Bank of Scotland sell Condor to a willing purchaser. What an example of pygmy grandeur, and what a joke.

And finally . . . Do those who would sit through prayers in a Court also sit through funeral services, or do they have appropriate respect for the occasion? Is there a difference?