SCOTTISH NEWS
SCOTLAND ISN’T ENGLAND: THE GREAT LICENSING DIVIDE
Article by Rob Finlayson Operations Manager City Cars Glasgow
rob@citycarsglasgow.co.uk
The biggest challenge in the UK taxi and private hire industry that we don’t talk about is the lack of a single unified system. Operators compare notes and kibitz, suppliers launch UK-wide products and policies, and discussions are had as if Glasgow, Manchester Birmingham and London all work the same way.
I’ll take this from the point of the biggest gulf between Scotland Vs England: where most of the UK runs on a patchwork of locally implemented polices post deregulation, Scotland is governed by a singular licencing framework - The Civic Government (Scotland) Act 1982. It’s not just a few different rules but our entire licensing structure, albeit interpreted by each local licensing authority in its own way.
Nowhere is this more evident than when we consider vehicle standards; whilst we are all governed by the same rules and regulations, one local authority will allow tinted glass on your vehicle whilst another will not, despite being adjacent. One will impose a seven- year age restriction on a vehicle’s licence whilst another will happily plate that 2003 Vectra with 500k miles on the clock and not bat an eye. The list of inconsistencies continues into every fabric of the trade with very little standardisation across this small country of 5.5 million people. We effectively have thirty-two versions of the same rules each with their own little idiosyncrasies.
The other issue we have north of the border is simply how outdated the legislation is. The original draft of the Civic Government Scotland Act was written in 1982 with a few minor amendments along the way.
It
certainly didn’t envisage drivers using PDAs or apps on their phone to be dispatched work; it certainly wasn’t written with ride-share in mind; and whilst there have been some minor adjustments and a grass roots push to see changes to the legislation that governs our trade, we’re still to all intents and purposes stuck firmly in 1982.
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Whilst we have had ride-share apps in Scotland for north of ten years now, they have never ventured out of the two main cities, until now. With a push into Aberdeen and into the “shires”, it will be interesting to watch what happens when multibillion-dollar corporations clash with the idiosyncrasies of smaller local councils. And this is where the real fun begins; once you layer outdated legislation interpreted by part time councillors who don’t fully understand the industry, the law or indeed the technology that is continually changing we are heading to a position where no one, not operators, not drivers and most certainly not the actual councils themselves are fully aligned on what good practice actually looks like
Ask five operators about a particular licensing rule and you’ll get five completely different answers, even amongst operators licensed by the same local authority. None of that is necessarily anyone’s fault, it’s a systematic failure of the framework being outpaced by the modern world around us in which we are all trying to operate.
Because the CGSA hasn’t evolved, operators and drivers are trying to fit 2025 realities into a 1982 shaped hole. It simply doesn’t fit. Whilst some councils try to modernise their interpretation to meet current needs, others cling to the past and refuse to address the modern world has changed around them. Although most of our 32 authorities try to sit somewhere in the middle, but doing so never really delivers any effective change.
This constantly evolving but never changing landscape of legislation creates real friction, not just for operators but for suppliers trying to roll-out national features or ride-share companies trying to expand their Scottish holdings and realising that simply flicking the switch to on up here doesn’t fly.
Glasgow and Edinburgh have embraced app-based companies; Aberdeen has felt the ripple this year and we are seeing real friction in the Granite city as ride- share comes up against historic legislation. It will certainly be interesting to watch how this rolls out over the coming months and years into the smaller authorities that are frankly not structured or ready for the changes ahead.
How long can Scotland keep operating a 2025 transport system on a 1982 rulebook?
DECEMBER 2025 PHTM
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