London cabbies & This Morning to search for missing people in 2012
21st December 2011
London cab drivers and ITV1’s flagship daytime show This Morning will launch their support for the charity Missing People’s ‘Join The Search’ campaign by putting posters of missing children in the back of their cabs.
A bank of six licensed London taxi cabs gathered at ITV studios on the South Bank today to launch the new initiative.
The idea for involving taxi drivers in the search for missing children came from taxi driver Colin Outhwaite, father of actress Tamzin Outhwaite.
Colin said “I was watching Gloria Hunniford appeal for a missing child on This Morning and thought to myself that taxi drivers are in the perfect position to help too. My hope is that more cabbies will come forward and volunteer to take the posters”
Thanks to the generosity of the UK’s leading taxi advertising company Ubiquitous, an additional ten branded ‘Join The Search’ cabs will be circulating London’s streets during January with posters of missing children on their tip seat posters.
Included are Andrew Gosden from Yorkshire, who went missing at the age of 14 and was last seen on CCTV footage at King’s Cross station in September 2007, and Lee Boxell who went missing from Sutton in September 1988 aged 15.
Approximately 100,000 children go missing every year in the UK. Missing People’s “Join the Search” campaign aims to mobilise the general public to take simple actions to help find them.
Adam Vandermark, Editor of This Morning, said: “We have often featured appeals on This Morning to help find missing people throughout the UK, but we wanted to step it up a gear and I’m sure that this joint venture with London cabs and our fantastic viewers will help reunite more families in 2012.”
Martin Houghton-Brown, Chief Executive of Missing People, said: “If your child went missing, wouldn't you want the whole world to stop and look for them? The charity Missing People is building a dedicated community of people across the UK ready to join the search online, at work and in their neighbourhood.
“We are so grateful to ITV1’s This Morning, Ubiquitous Taxis, Colin Outhwaite and all of the London cab drivers who have joined the search for some of the UK’s most vulnerable children.”
On their support of the campaign, Andrew Barnett, Managing Director of Ubiquitous Taxis commented, “It’s well documented that many missing children head for the capital, where the search heavily relies on the help of the public.
Black cabs travel every road, avenue and street in London, so are able to provide a thorough way to circulate the Missing People message.”
This Morning is on weekdays, 10.30am on ITV1. For more information visit www.itv.com/thismorning The public can join the search on twitter @missingpeople and facebook www.facebook.com/missingpeople.uk