Agenda item

The Specialist – Licensing presented the report.  She advised that Councils were required to implement the Statutory Taxi and Private Vehicle Standards as part of their normal procedures unless there were compelling reasons not to. She explained that the standards set out a number of new and amended practices such as keeping a record of any licences that had been refused, working with the Police to update them on any action that the Council had taken in relation to licences, drivers being subject to 6 monthly Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks, annual basic disclosure required for vehicle applicants and private hire operator applicants and licence holders and the use of CCTV in licensed vehicles.

The Lead Specialist – Environmental Health said that members were being asked to approve work to create a Somerset Hackney Carriage and Private Hire Licensing Policy.  She updated that Sedgemoor District Council had recently updated their policy and were currently going through a consultation process.  The other districts would use the information from the consultation process to inform any changes and would look as a whole group to use the revised policy and align all the districts to the same policy. 

She referred to the wheelchair accessible vehicle part of the policy and advised that Sedgemoor District Council had proposed to fix a number of wheelchair accessible vehicles for hackney carriages and would allow those to be replaced going forward but the figure would be capped.  For example, if a driver currently had a non-wheelchair accessible vehicle and wished to replace it with a new one they would be allowed to do so but the old licence would be surrendered and replaced with a new one for a non-wheelchair vehicle.  As those licences lapsed they would not be replaced and the numbers would gradually be reduced with a move towards wheelchair accessible vehicles only but would allow those with non-wheelchair accessible vehicles to continue to operate.  Any proposed changes to the policy would be subject to full consultation within each district area.

In response to questions raised, members were informed of the following:

·         Vehicles would be defined as being useable by wheelchair users and this could be further refined if two types of vehicle were required and different types of wheelchair accessibility vehicles could be incorporated into the policy;

·         Private hire vehicles would have no restrictions;

·         It was the intention to have a Somerset-wide Hackney Carriage and Private Hire Licensing Policy that each district had signed up to but would have to go through the political process for each individual district.  If this was not achievable, each district could have their own policy but would be aligned to the other district policies;

·         The licensing service continued to look for efficiencies in delivering the service.   The increase in work around checking disclosures and barring was being looked at with the other Somerset authorities with a view to partners undertaking some of the checks; 

·         Drivers paid the cost of the criminal records check and could also subscribe to the update service.  The driver could pay a fee to enable them to take their certificate to another authority;

·         Drivers were required to report any convictions or offences to the Council;

·         The standards recommend that a database is used to record information about licences that had been refused;

·         It was possible that additional training for the Licensing Committee would be required to cover issues such as Safeguarding of Children.

During the discussion, members raised the following comments:

·         The ultimate aim of all local authorities in Somerset was to amalgamate services to make them more efficient and accountable and a Somerset Hackney Carriage and Private Hire Licensing Policy was in line with this;

·         Customers needed to have a choice of vehicle as a lot of customers preferred not to travel in a wheelchair accessible vehicles.  In response, the Lead Specialist – Environment asked members to forward any comments received about the use of different types of vehicle which would assist in the policy going forward.

At the conclusion of the debate, it was proposed and seconded to approve the recommendations as outlined in the report.  A vote was taken and the recommendations were unanimously approved.