SINCE WHEN HAS ‘FIT AND PROPER’ Continued from previous page
At least, from within the West Yorkshire Combined Authority area, one council has rebelled – albeit temporarily. As you will see in this month’s Round the Councils pages, Kirklees Council has suspended their Suitability Policy pending further dis- cussions. Council leader Councillor Pandor said: “I agree that we need to have anoth- er look at this. There needs to be flexibility in the implementation of this policy so as not to penalise good drivers who have served the public safely and well for many years.”
NPHTA comment: Following the January demonstration we spoke at length with the chair of the Leeds Private Hire Drivers Organisation, Ahmad Hussain, as you’ll see from our front page report this month. We believe one point must be highlighted here: when Andrew White, head of licensing at Leeds City Council, was challenged about taking up the IoL guidance in its entirety, he denied this.
In fairness, Mr White is correct in one aspect: the IoL guidance (at 4.42) sets out a ban of five years for re-applying for a licence following a ban for seven DVLA points. Leeds’ proposal is for that ban to last three years.
However, Mr White was heard to state that Leeds City Council had taken their lead [for their new policy] not from the IoL but from the Department for Transport. We would respectfully refute any possibility of that happening, on the basis that the DfT has always maintained complete and total neutrality in all taxi/PHV licensing matters.
They may publish Best Practice guidance – and the Statutory Guidance is due out shortly - but they do not formulate policy either nationally or locally. They have always made it abundantly clear that if any licence holder has a problem with local pol- icy or conditions of licence, their ultimate avenue of challenge is through the courts.
This position can be reiterated by the Task and Finish group, whose 34 recommenda- tions were submitted to the Government in February 2019. Within those recommenda- tions which were approved, there was no mention whatever of strict numerical limits on DVLA points for minor driving offences causing a lengthy ban on re-application for a taxi or PHV driver’s licence.
We just wanted to set the record straight… 64
vehicle, or being abusive or a mixture of all three with drugs. A great cocktail which distracts you for a split second enough to get caught. And these SPs can be from low speeds; we’re not talking about an SP for 100mph.
REBELLION IN THE SOUTH EAST AS WELL
As recently as a fortnight before press deadline for this edition, the NPHTA was contacted by a local association based in the Southend/Rochford area. They call themselves “The Voice of Reason”; they have affiliated to the NPHTA, and they have just armed themselves for a challenge against Rochford Council’s proposals to apply the IoL guidance as policy for their licence holders.
Graham Hutchinson, chair of the group, gave us an insight as to what is going on:
“We have 14 councils here in Essex, and the only council thus far that has adopted this guidance is Rochford. There are four coun- cils that have points as issues for new applicants, but none has adopted these stupid senseless guidelines.
“The hackney carriage officer put forward the recommendation [to adopt the IoL guid- ance] to the Portfolio Holder for Taxi Licensing; it didn’t go in front of full council and no discussions with the trade took place. It was just brought in with no licensed drivers having any knowledge of this policy. The first we knew of it was when drivers were being caught up in failing to meet the new policy structure.
“Our association has come out of the wood- work to take on the council. We run ourselves as a limited company, “The Hack- ney Carriage Association Ltd”. There is to be a meeting on the 30th January between our association’s committee members and the Leader and Deputy Leader of the coun- cil. They must take note that if we need to take action against the council we will be doing so through our association.
“The reason behind us agreeing to take action against this guidance is simple: It is the easiest thing in the world for a taxi driv- er to collect SP points; speed cameras operate 24/7, in the rush hour as well as 2- 3am in the morning. We pick up druggies, drunks, people to airports etc. You often find yourself under pressure trying to make a flight because of a hold-up on the M25, or a drunk honking up in the back of your
“A licensed driver who is granted a badge has had to have a group 2 medical, be DBS checked, have the vehicle passed, insurance checked and so on. Where is the sense in getting rid of these bona fide drivers over whom they have total control, and thus opening the door to Uber and other such drivers of varying types, over which the council has no control?
“Clearly Rochford Council has introduced this guidance in order to protect their res- idents/council tax payers, but on the contrary they are going to wipe out their licensed drivers. This guidance should go right across the board to all council employees and councillors as well, who are not DBS checked themselves and don’t hold child exploitation certs and PATS certs etc.
“Let’s get all these councillors and hackney officers licensed and out there in taxis at all times of the day and night, picking up some of our unsavoury customers, and see how well they do! I bet they wouldn’t last five minutes doing our job, and certainly if they were out there 24/7/365 they would collect some points.
“Don’t throw stones at people in glass houses.”
JAMES BUTTON’S REPLY
Amidst all this IoL-bashing, in all fairness we approached its President, James But- ton, for a comment as to the justification behind the Institute of Licensing Suitability guidance.
James Button FEBRUARY 2020
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112
