30 Policy Changes Relating to Taxi Licencing Conditions PDF 83 KB
Minutes:
The Board received a report from the Strategic
Director – Enterprise, Community and Resources, which made a recommendation
from Regulatory Committee to adopt, as Council policy in respect of the Council’s
taxi and private hire jurisdiction, the Assessment
of Previous Convictions provisions in the Statutory Taxi and Private Hire
Vehicle Standards (July 2020); and to revoke all existing Relevance of Convictions policies.
It was reported that in February 2019 the
Department for Transport issued a consultation draft version of a document entitled
Taxi and Private Hire Licensing:
Protecting Users. The final version
of the document was issued in July 2020 and was entitled Statutory Taxi and Private Hire Standards.
It was noted that the 2020 Standards had been issued
under Section 177 of the Policing and Crime Act 2017, so the Council was
required to have regard to the document when exercising its taxi and private
hire licensing functions. Members were
referred to Appendix A – an annex within the document titled Assessment of Previous Convictions. They
were advised that Regulatory Committee had been applying the Assessment of Previous Convictions on a
case by case basis since February 2019 and it was now considered appropriate to
formalise this and create a formal policy, which
would then supersede the existing policy.
The Board noted that the new Assessment of Previous Convictions
appeared to be clearer than the previous policy and placed passenger safety as
a priority, whilst enabled past offenders to sufficiently evidence that they had
been successfully rehabilitated so they might obtain or retain a licence.
RESOLVED:
That
1) The Assessment of Previous Convictions provisions in the Statutory Taxi
and Private Hire Vehicle Standards (July 2020) be adopted as Council policy in
respect of Taxi and Private Hire jurisdiction; and
2) All existing Relevance of Convictions policies be revoked.