On Wednesday, the Riigikogu rejected in the first reading a bill initiated by the Isamaa party to amend the Language Act and the Public Transport Act, which would have introduced a requirement for taxi drivers to have at least a B1 level of proficiency in the Estonian language.
The Culture Committee, as the leading committee, proposed to reject the bill in the first reading, as the government is already addressing this issue. 45 members of the Riigikogu voted for the rejection of the bill, while 18 voted against it. As a result, the bill was withdrawn from consideration.
Amendments to the Public Transport Act would have restored the requirement for taxi drivers to confirm their knowledge of the Estonian language before obtaining a service card by providing the relevant document. Such a document could be a certificate of passing the Estonian language proficiency exam or a document confirming the completion of basic, general secondary, vocational education based on basic education, secondary vocational education based on basic education, or higher education in Estonian.
The Public Transport Act, which came into force in 2015, stipulated that an applicant for a taxi driver service card must have at least a B1 level of proficiency in the Estonian language. This meant that the issuing authority, i.e., the local municipality or another authorized institution, had to verify the applicant's proficiency in the Estonian language, and the applicant was obliged to provide the relevant certificate. In 2016, this requirement was abolished, justified by double regulation, as the language proficiency requirement for taxi drivers had already been established by a government decree based on the Language Act.
"Five years have passed since the law was amended, and unfortunately, it must be noted that the amendment has not justified itself, as more than a thousand drivers with insufficient language knowledge are providing taxi services. The control carried out only within the framework of supervision has not proven to be an effective measure to ensure the language requirement for taxi drivers," the explanatory note to the bill states.
The Tallinn Municipal Police Department, as well as the Language Department, constantly receives complaints about taxi drivers who do not speak a word of Estonian. Complainants have repeatedly noted that the driver could not communicate in other widely spoken international languages in our region, such as English or Russian.
