Andy Peters
Brighton & Hove Cab Trade Association
info@bhcta.co.uk www.bhcta.co.uk
My mum always told me to eat my greens; well the good citizens of Brighton & Hove (B&H) certainly ate the Greens in the local elections, chewed them up and spat them out. So, from being the only Green- controlled local authority (at the time) they have been obliterated, with a report that one of them actually left the count in tears, resulting in a majority Labour-controlled council.
This is what happens when you have well meaning people with ideological ideas which they try to force others to comply with. It’s called ‘social engineering.’ Let’s not forget the meeting they had on world nuclear disarmament whilst the city’s rubbish was not cleared and the weeds were taking over the pavements - what the Greens referred to as “re-wilding’ - I kid you not!
This was actually a surprise because the good citizens here always thought that with the extremely high student population the Greens’ reign would continue, so that was nicely proved wrong. More likely what happened is the young darlings couldn’t be bothered to get out of bed to vote. I should make the point that I did strike up a good working relationship with those Green councillors on the Licensing Committee and one of them remains, who is a driving instructor. Do you see the irony of this?
I also have to say that I am pretty much non-political and try to make friends with everyone. But the reason for the little rant is because we all know that the Greens are anti-car and they have made a concerted effort to get everyone out of their cars and on their bikes or to put on their walking shoes.
There was a citizens’ revolt on a controversial bike lane in a very busy main road, where the bike use data was manipulated (which I found out after an FOI request) that I used to challenge the council at a full council meeting. This awful bike lane was eventually removed, much to the boo-hoo of the Greens. Another bike lane was put on the main seafront road that causes terrible congestion, which is probably considered a good thing by the Greens to put people off driving. This has unfortunately remained.
70
We’ve also had a plan for one of those controversial Low Traffic Neighbourhood (LTN) schemes which hopefully seems to have been thrown out. There was also talk of this oddly called ‘15 Minutes City’, or more aptly called ‘15 Minute Ghettos’. Plus there is the planned removal of a major roundabout on the seafront that was hated by the Greens, which is used with little issue compared to the millions of cars that use it each year. I remember the Green councillor driving instructor saying that a lot of people can’t cope with it, I told him that he needs to be teaching better.
Ultimately, all these changes to the structure of the city affect the daily workings of the taxi trade, plus the general working relationship with the council. So, yet again, we have to go through the four-yearly task of the trade having to retrain those new councillors who do not a have a scooby about us and what we do. I took a deep sigh after I typed this out.
PENALTY POINTS
Do you have these? Licensing tried to have this system put in place some eight years ago now which was rejected by the trade, and I am pleased to say that I had a lot of involvement with that rejection. However, with a Penalty Points system now included in the 2022 ‘Best Practice Guide’, or what is referred to as a ‘points-based enforcement system’ this is now being looked at again.
We were presented with what looked like a copy and paste from somewhere else which covered several odd possible breaches. An example being that penalty points would be given to operators and drivers under: ‘failure to attend punctually at appointed time and place without sufficient cause.’ Does this mean a pre- booking? Also, points awarded for ‘unsatisfactory appearance of a driver’ when we all know that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. It’s all very draconian so the trade needs to be on top of this.
UBER - CHANGING THE RULES
For many years the trade here has worked closely with the council and local disability groups to continuously improve travel for wheelchair users. Before Uber landed here the trade persuaded the council to have an operator condition of licensing that any cab company with a fleet of 100 + cars would need to have 20% WAVs.
JUNE 2023 PHTM
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
