1.
SV Reporter hails taxi
0.10

2.
TRAVEL SHOT..taxi
0.14

3.
CU Taxi radio - TILT to driver
0.26

4.
SV INTERIOR..drivers practising karate
0.48

5.
MV Reporter and a taxi driver
1.39

6.
SV Staged sequence showing karate trainer (a taxi driver) dealing with three 'thugs'
2.11


TRANSCRIPT: SEQ. 5: REPORTER: "What made you decide to take up this karate ?"



DRIVER: "Well, on two occasions I was beaten up, during my working hours, and I decided to try to find some means of defending myself."



REPORTER: "You were beaten up -- what happened ?"



DRIVER: "Well, on one occasion two drunks jumped into the back there and they refused to come out, and I didn't want to take them, so I got into the cab to try to get them out of the back of the cab, and the two of them jumped upon me, and beat me up quite badly"



REPORTER: "When you say quite badly, were you in hospital?"



DRIVER: "No, I was off work for about a week."



REPORTER: "What about the other time ?"



DRIVER: "That was in a case where they refused to pay a fare. There was one chap, and I got out of the car to deal with him, and his friend came running out of the house, and the two of them set about me. Again I was beaten up, but not enough to go into hospital."



REPORTER: "How often does this kind of thing happen in Glasgow ?"



DRIVER: "Well, to me personally it doesn't happen every night, but it does happen every night to different drivers."




Initials JB/JF/ES.14.18 JB/JF/ES.15.08



Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: A number of taxi drivers in Glasgow, Scotland, have taken up karate so that they can protect themselves if attacked.

They are concerned about the number of attacks made , usually at night, on drivers as they go about their business in the Glasgow area.

One driver said there were attacks almost every night on taxi drivers, and he himself had twice been beaten up.

Karate is a form of unarmed combat which developed on the island of Okinawa some 300 years ago when the local people were banned from possessing weapons. They developed a deadly form of self-defence, using their hands, feet, elbows and knuckles which are toughened by special training.