Taxi drivers a credit to Malta

Last week while spending a very pleasant seven-day holiday with my wife in Malta I happened to read in The Times that local taxi drivers had been overcharging visitors. But I'd like to give readers another side to the coin.

During our stay we arranged a very fair hourly rate with a taxi driver to take us to inland places of interest. The anticipated duration of the trip was three hours. We took our time, indeed encouraged I suppose by our driver, so that when we eventually returned to our hotel four hours had elapsed.

To my (I must admit) complete surprise the driver refused point blank to accept more than the rate for three hours stating that he had told us to take our time. During our stay we used taxis about 10 times and without exception all of the drivers were pleasant, informative and by world standards a credit to their country - and we were not overcharged.

So let's hear it for the Maltese taxi drivers!