Video: Our driver did not kill a duck and her chicks says under-fire taxi firm

Accusations were posted on social media that a driver for Ace-ABC Taxis had deliberately hit the duck and her chicks as they crossed the road at the Mill dam, near Warsop leaving two surviving ducklings without a mother.Now Ace-ABC Taxis of Great Central Road, Mansfield have released dashcam footage they say proves their driver was entirely innocent of the accusations.

Nick Shaw manager said the driiver who has not been named was upset by the incident and was concerned for his own safety after abuse was posted on social media.

He said: "We would never condone a driver running a duck over - it goes without saying. We are happy with what the driver said - maybe he could have handled it a bit better."

"This has been the worst 24 hours we have had for a while. We have had fake jobs rang in to us and abusive answerphone messages."

In a statement statement published on social media, Ace-ABC Taxis said:

"Unfortunately earlier today one of our drivers was accused of deliberately killing a duck and ducklings near Warsop whilst driving near the Carrs. We were upset to hear this and as soon as this was highlighted to us we began an investigation to find the driver so we could understand what had happened. All we had to help was the fact that it was a silver car with a bald driver. This may sound a relatively easy task; however we have over 80 silver cars and at least the same number of drivers that have access to those vehicles. We of course would never encourage or condone such actions and quietly continued our investigation; we know it is an offence to deliberately kill a duck as set out in the Wildlife & Countryside Act so we were not taking the accusation lightly. There have been a lot of comments asking about tracking and knowing about where all the cars are etc… and there have been the usual haters who have made hurtful comments towards all taxi drivers, asking for wives and children to be run over, people stating they will never use us in fear of rape, threats to the drivers and unfortunately the usual racial slurs on men and women just going about their business trying to earn an honest living and just get by.

"We understand whatever we post there will always be social media users who will not take anything we say on face value and are happy to stir the pot and undermine our business. We are posting our opinion on the footage we have seen.Yes we have found the driver, yes we have spoken to him and yes we have seen the CCTV of the duck in the road. So here is the statement of what happened and our thoughts on the drivers account of the incident.

We feel the footage we have seen in the office supports this and have posted a copy of the footage below.

The driver approaches the Carrs on the main road and slows as he sees a duck in the middle of the road. The driver moves out into the middle of the road to avoid the “live” ducklings that are near the kerb and stops directly in front of the duck. The driver views the duck for a second to see that the duck and ducklings on the road are dead and slowly drives over the birds avoiding them with his wheels, positioning them in the middle of his vehicle. He then moves slowly away leaving the scene. The driver has stated that he saw the car behind him stop so he continued on his way knowing someone was tending to the remaining ducklings. We are happy that the footage supports this however, we have told the driver that in our opinion he could have stopped and moved the dead ducks himself and assisted the ducklings. The driver accepts in hindsight he should have checked on the ducklings but felt uneasy about moving the dead birds. We also accept that to the vehicle behind and also to the second vehicle approaching from the Mansfield area that it looks like our vehicle had hit the ducks. This is not the case and we are happy to provide any information to any investigating body that may be looking into this.

We will be making no further statement on this matter and thank you for your patience while we found the vehicle involved.

The statement adds:

Here at ACE-ABC we take all our responsibilities very seriously• All our company vehicles are serviced and maintained to the highest standard• All company owned vehicles contain CCTV for your safety and the drivers safety too• All vehicles can be tracked when working. If they are not logged onto our system we can’t see them.• If the vehicle is driving the CCTV is working even if not visible on our taxi system.• All our drivers have to jump several hurdles to acquire a badge and are not just dragged off the street and given keys. They have to pass a DBS, a Medical, a DVLA check, attend safeguarding courses, knowledge tests on geography and taxi law and if they originate from a country outside the UK provide a certificate of good conduct from their country of origin.We understand whatever we post there will always be social media users who will not take anything we say on face value and are happy to stir the pot and undermine our business.