«The social taxi is an initiative that has just started in Calabria. It gives citizens over 65 the opportunity to be accompanied for a visit or to book it at a cup that is more than 20 kilometers away.” This is the innovative project presented today by the President of the Calabria Region Roberto Occhiuto at the American Studies Center in Rome as part of a debate sponsored by the American Chamber of Commerce in Italy which had as its theme “The courage to innovate”.
The comparison with Uber and the Calabrian project
Occhiuto spoke with Tony West, senior vice president and chief legal officer of Uber, former senior official of the United States Department of Justice during the Obama presidency, considered one of the most authoritative figures in the American technological and legal world.
The social taxi service, entirely financed by the Region with resources from the European Social Fund – explained Occhiuto – «adds an important piece to the path of innovation of regional health services; provides that the citizen receives a car at home that will accompany him, wait for him while he makes the visit and take him home.
«Let’s bring citizens closer to hospitals»
It is a way – observed the Calabrian governor – also to eliminate waiting lists because sometimes the services are available but too far from the homes of those who request those services. In this way we bring citizens closer to Calabrian hospitals and clinics and we can do this having liberalized the demand-driven transport market and having demonstrated that liberalizations are not so much useful to the companies operating in the market – continued Occhiuto – but serve to make the market the instrument for bringing citizens closer to public services as in the case of the social taxi”.
The theme of reforms and liberalizations
Occhiuto then underlined that «liberalizing, freeing oneself from the encrustations of corporations is never popular. Some people fear losing some votes, but since it’s right, then it becomes popular. I would like this courage to be practiced more in Italian politics, because to make reforms you always need courage: reforms are a break with the past, a break with many corporations that hold the market hostage and, by holding the market hostage, they hold citizens hostage with respect to some services. Courage is needed, but carrying out liberal reforms is an investment, because that courage then pays off in terms of popularity, even if in the long term.”