Agenda and minutes

The minutes of the meeting held on 6 January 2010 were signed by the Chairman as a correct record.

There were no items of urgent business.

There were no declarations of interest.

A representative from MOGO has been invited to attend the meeting to answer questions from the committee regarding the signage which they provide to licensing.

The Licensing Manager advised the committee that a representative had been invited from MOGO (Mr Gerald Hart) to attend the meeting to answer questions from the committee regarding the signage which they provide to licensing. It was reported that complaints had been received regarding the new door signs provided by MOGO.

Mr. Hart advised the committee that MOGO had been supplying local authorities since 1994, and currently supplied door signs, badges and plates to 222 local authorities. Mr. Hart advised that MOGO had supplied 13,100 door signs in 2010 and that they had never received a single complaint in the past. Members were informed that MOGO had experimented using different brands of polish, and that the only thing which they had found which would remove the print from the door signs was t-cut.

Mr. Hart advised the committee that he had contacted some of the local authorities to which MOGO provided door signs, South Lakeland District Council, Craven District Council and Chorley Borough Council had all responded to say that they had not experienced any problems with the door stickers. Copies of these responses were circulated to members for information. The Licensing Manager advised that she had contacted 848 Taxis and Coastal Taxis, who had both indicated that they were pleased with the new door signs. The Licensing Manager also advised that out of approximately 400 vehicles which had been issued with the new door signs only 3 or 4 drivers had reported issues with the stickers.

Members considered examples and photographs of the damaged door stickers which had been provided by members of the trade.

Members queried whether MOGO had begun to manufacture the door signs from different materials from the previous examples provided. It was advised that this was not the case, and that MOGO always used industry standard materials.

The Licensing Manager advised that she had contacted Signs Express to enquire as to whether they had experienced any problems with the adhesive on the door signs. It was advised that Signs Express believed there would only be a problem with the adhesion of the door signs if the vehicle had not been cleaned adequately before application of the sticker, or if there was a thin layer of frost on the surface of the car when the sticker was applied.

The Chairman thanked Mr. Hart for his attendance on behalf of the committee.

Report of the Licensing Manager.

Mr. Millership of Mouchel Ltd. has been invited to attend the meeting to present the findings of the hackney carriage unmet demand survey and to answer any questions the committee may have.

The Licensing Manager presented a report to enable Members to consider the findings of the survey conducted by Mouchel Ltd.

Members were reminded that the Council currently had a policy of restricting the number of Hackney Carriage licences issued. However, in maintaining such a policy the Council had to provide evidence that there was no significant unmet demand for Hackney Carriage services within the area in order to be in a position to refuse any new applications for additional licences. For this purpose, it was considered necessary to commission an independent survey to assess the level of demand for hackney carriage services, and that such survey should be conducted by an organisation specialising in this area of work.

Members were advised that in 2007 a hackney carriage demand survey was carried out by Transportation Planning (International) Limited (TPI) on the Council’s behalf. At that time, TPI had concluded that there was no significant unmet demand for hackney carriages and at a meeting of the Licensing Regulatory Committee held on the 21 April 2008 members resolved to maintain the existing policy restricting the number of hackney carriages licensed to 109.

It was generally accepted that the findings of hackney carriage demand surveys were valid for no longer than three years. An independent survey to assess the level of demand for Hackney Carriage services had, therefore, been commissioned from Mouchel Ltd.

Mr. Millership of Mouchel gave a detailed presentation of the findings of the study and answered questions from members. A copy of Mouchel’s final report was appended to the Licensing Manager’s report for members’ information.

Mr. Millership reported that the objectives of the study were to determine whether or not there existed a significant unmet demand for Hackney Carriage services and to determine the number of licences required to meet any identified unmet demand in Lancaster City.   On the basis of the analyses conducted, the conclusion had been that a significant unmet demand did not exist for Hackney Carriages in Lancaster City at present.

During the presentation Mr. Millership gave an overview of Mouchel’s recommendations.

He drew attention to the excellent service which was provided at the daytime rank at Market Street in Morecambe, commenting that this should be encouraged and consolidated. The bus station rank in Lancaster also provided a good service, and the video survey of the rank had recorded an excellent example of a driver providing assistance to a wheelchair user. Mr. Millership also commented that Licensing provided a very good service to drivers, and that the Taxi Liaison Group was very good.

Members requested that the Democratic Support Officer arrange for a press release to be released which drew attention to findings of the survey.

The report recommended that the installation of information boards at ranks to advertise service be considered, this was a recommendation that was currently being made to a large number of licensing authorities. It was also recommended that service to late night pressure points be checked between May and July 2011 to  ...  view the full minutes text for item 83.

Report of the Licensing Manager.

The Licensing Manager introduced a report to enable Members to consider the level of fees for 2011/12.

The committee were advised that the report was concerned with the setting of the licence fees for hackney carriage and private hire licences and miscellaneous licences issued by the Council. Members were reminded that licences issued under the Licensing Act 2003, together with the licences issued under the Gambling Act 2005 fall within the remit of the Licensing Act Committee and not this Committee. For the purpose of 2010/2011 budgetary process the Committee had approved an increase for the hackney carriage vehicle licence fee for 2010/11 from £215.00 to £308.60 to cover the additional costs of the Hackney Carriage Demand Survey, the Committee had been satisfied that there should be no further increase in licence fees for hackney carriages and private hire licences and for miscellaneous licences. There had been no increases in fees for the above categories since April 2007.

Members were reminded that it had for many years been the policy of the Council for the licensing service to be self-financing. The annual revision of fees sought to ensure that the costs of the service would be met from the income. However, it was not lawful for the Council to seek to make a profit from licence fees that are within its discretion.

It was advised that following a financial assessment of time allocations for licensing staff, internal departmental re-charges together with other costs borne by the licensing service over the past year, the current fees charged for hackney carriages and private hire vehicle licensing and miscellaneous licensing had been reviewed. As a result of this exercise, it had been established that substantially more officer time was being spent on hackney carriage and private hire licensing than was the case twelve months ago, and, taking this into account, the budgeted cost of hackney carriage and private hire licensing for 2011/12 would be £226,300, and £14,900 for miscellaneous licensing.

Members were advised that it was impossible to estimate with any degree of certainty the amount of income from licence fees, given that some licence holders may decide not to renew their licence, and there may or may not be a number of new applications for licences. However, on the basis of the best possible estimate of numbers of licences that would be issued in 2011/12, it was estimated that, if the fees remained at the same levels as in 2010/11, income from hackney carriage and private hire licensing would be £159,000 and £13,600 for miscellaneous licensing.

Officers considered that it was necessary to increase the hackney carriage and private hire licensing fees but not necessary to increase the fees for miscellaneous licences.

With regard to miscellaneous licensing, this meant that there will be a budgeted deficit of £1,300, but it was felt that this properly reflected the work undertaken in respect of licences where a fee would not be recovered.

For Members’ information, details of the above two categories of fees were  ...  view the full minutes text for item 84.

The following report is not for publication because it contains confidential information relating to cautions/convictions and will be considered whilst the public are excluded from the meeting. The applicant has been invited to attend and/or be represented at the meeting, but will be asked to leave whilst the Committee makes the decision, as exempt legal advice may be given.

Members are advised that, in accordance with Section 100A(2) of the Local Government Act 1972, the press and public should be excluded for the following item of business on the grounds that they could include the possible disclosure of confidential information.

In accordance with Section 100A(2) of the Local Government Act 1972, the press and public were excluded for the following items of business on the grounds that they could include the possible disclosure of confidential information.

Report of the Senior Licensing Officer.

The Licensing Manager introduced a report to enable members to consider Mr. Duncan’s application for a private hire driver’s licence.

Details of the individual case are set out in confidential minute no. 86 in accordance with Section 100A(2) of the Local Government Act 1972. 

It was proposed by Councillor Greenall and seconded by Councillor Redfern: -

“That Mr. Duncan’s application for a private hire driver’s licence be refused.”

Upon being put to the vote Members voted unanimously in favour of the proposition, whereupon the Chairman declared the proposition to be carried. 

Resolved:

That Mr. Duncan’s application for a private hire driver’s licence be refused.