Agenda and minutes

To approve as a correct record the Minutes of the meeting of this Committee held on 18 November 2019.

The Minutes of the meeting held on 18 November 2019 were approved as a true and correct record and signed by the Chairman. The Chairman noted that Councillor Peter Argyle had stood down from the Committee and on behalf of the Committee he wanted to wish him well on his recovery. The Chairman welcomed Councillor Hilary Cole as his replacement on the Committee.

To remind Members of the need to record the existence and nature of any personal, disclosable pecuniary or other registrable interests in items on the agenda, in accordance with the Members’ Code of Conduct.

There were no declarations of interest received.

Purpose: To allow Members to consider the responses received during the 28 day statutory consultation period concerning the proposed fees in relation to hackney carriage and private hire licensing.

The Committee considered a report (Agenda Item 4) which set out the responses received during the 28 day statutory consultation period concerning the proposed fees in relation to hackney carriage and private hire licensing.

Suzanne McLaughlin stated that the fees were discussed at the November 2019 meeting and were then consulted on in accordance with the statutory provisions as set out in section 70 of the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1976. An advert was placed in the Newbury Weekly News on the 12 December 2019. The consultation ended on the 08 January 2020. In addition to the statutory requirement 387 letters were also sent to 158 hackney carriage and 166 private hire drivers as well as 63 private hire operators informing them of the consultation.

The consultation resulted in 28 responses, 26 of which were objections and two were comments related to fees but were matters which fell outside of the consultation. The objections were set out in appendix D to the report. Primarily these queried how the increase could be justified, raised concerns that it was an above inflation increase and was not wanted. In addition to the responses set out in the original paperwork the following additional comments were considered by the Committee:

Purpose: To allow Members to consider the responses received during the 28 day consultation period with the trade concerning the proposed tariffs in relation to hackney carriage licensing. The key consideration is the balance between supporting small business and ensuring the general public has access to a good value hackney carriage service across all areas of the District.

The Committee considered a report (Agenda Item 5) which set out the responses received during the 28 day consultation period with the trade concerning the proposed tariffs in relation to hackney carriage licensing.

Suzanne McLaughlin noted that at the meeting on the 18 November 2019 it was agreed that Hackney Carriage Proprietors and Private Hire Operators would be consulted on proposed taxi tariffs following a request received from an operator. The operator had requested a 9% increase on Tariffs 1 and 2 and no increase on Tariff 3. Members had discussed the operator’s proposals and had made some suggested amendments and these were set out in Appendix C to the report. Any amendments had to adhere to section 65 of the local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1976.

The consultation with the trade ran from the 06 December 2019 to 06 January 2020. All 229 Hackney carriage Proprietors and operators were contacted via a letter.

During the consultation period 37 responses were received. One additional response was received that fell outside of the consultation period. 31 of the 38 responses were in favour of the proposals, six wanted no change and one other option was proposed. Additional responses not included in the original paperwork were set out below: