Perth Voice Interactive

A TAXI driver was spotted doing a poo on a Leederville verge around 9.50am Tuesday.

A resident was walking her dog when she spotted the driver squatting on the Burke Street verge near the Britannia Park tennis courts, and it looked like he’d come prepared, with his own roll of toilet paper.

She says public toilets were just 30 metres away.

“He’s squatting down, and then I saw him wiping his bottom and I went… he is taking a dump right on the side of the road!” she told the Voice.

“You want to see the mess this guy left behind!

“It was so daring of him to do it, I can’t believe that he even chose to do that when there were toilets so close by.”

Toilet paper was strewn everywhere but when she called on the dirty driver to clean up the mess he simply hopped into his car and drove off.

The woman took photographic evidence, wrote down the cab number and reported it to Vincent city council, whose workers will presumbly have to scrape the human excrement from the leaves and grass.

“In all my years as mayor, I get many different issues raised with me, but this actually took the cake,” mayor John Carey told the Voice. “It shocked me. And I just don’t understand it. We’re doing everything we can to beautify our streets with more verges and trees yet someone has decided to treat our streets as a public toilet.

“Given the fact we’ve installed a new self-cleaning toilet in Leederville and there are other toilets nearby I cannot understand why someone would choose to do that, and then it’s left to Vincent staff to clean up.

“Do I as mayor have to send a message out: do not use our streets as a public toilet? I’ve referred it to our health team and they’ll be going directly to Swan Taxis.”

The council’s decided not to pursue the driver as the hassle’s not worth the $100 fine, but it is hoping Swan Taxis handles it internally.

by DAVID BELL