Taxi driver fined for having too many passengers claims extra person was a blow-up doll

A ‘party bus’ driver has continued to insist a blow-up doll was the extra passenger that caused council licensing officials to fine him. Bash Ali was driving his yellow minibus full of Saturday night revellers celebrating a birthday in Manchester city centre when he was pulled over by council licensing officials, a court heard. He was told they had counted nine passengers in the Mercedes when the maximum number he is allowed to carry is eight.

Ali, who was driving the party from Oldham to a bar at Deansgate Locks, protested that he had eight human passengers – and one inflatable mannequin dressed as a woman. But, at a hearing at Manchester magistrates court, Ali, 41, of Oldham, changed his plea to guilty at the last minute. He told the court he had been denied legal aid and could not afford a lawyer. Convicting him of using a motor vehicle on a road when the load or passengers were likely to cause danger, magistrates ordered him to pay £438.12 in fines and costs.



Paul Scott, prosecuting, told the court that the officers had spotted the yellow cab driving along Whitworth Street at around 9pm on Saturday, March 30. They said strobe lights were flashing inside and music was blaring out – with passengers shouting to people on the street. They pulled over the cab and counted seven women and two men in the back. Mr Scott added: “Under interview, he [Ali] stated that one of the passengers was a mannequin and not a human being.

“When it was put to him that two officers had performed a headcount he stated that the officers must have been mistaken. There are dangers, clearly, for anybody inside the vehicle and anybody outside the vehicle when it is overloaded. So essentially what the council says is that the vehicle was overloaded and that they were all human beings.” Ali, a married father of four, said after the case: “I have no faith in the justice system. I see all sorts of sights in this job – men dressed as women, women dressed as men and yes, plenty of dolls dressed up too.”