First and foremost you have to look at the overall situation!
Before this freedom first came about you could have up to a six week wait to get your car/cab plated
the cost in comparison to a normal MOT place is also exceptionally high - so it fails two fold.A year or so down the line it now stacks up that Cardiff hackneys over a five year period have more than doubled from 450 hacks to over 957 - a nice little earner for them! If you then take into consideration that they are trying to claw back this lost business causing a massive financial loss then in effect it would make the council biased. They are now looking into vehicles more thoroughly on a more regular basis to make it look worse than what it is, you also have to take into account that because of the increase in driver license fees (over twice as much as they did five years ago) that they now receive, that they are now able to do more checks of which they never did before (this being self funded by the drivers) again making the stats look worse by stating that the year on year failures are getting worse.
The bottom line being is that the drivers have had their income (cake wise) cut by over 50% and the recession has on top of this taken another chunk, we have also fallen from (I think) 53 rd in the national ranking table to around 140 odd out of 300 +! So it is possible that drivers up and down the country are not able to maintain their cars/cabs due to deregulation/fuel increases/recession that has caused a vast drop in income, on this situation I do see it mentioned that a drop in standards in many areas up and down the U.K. has happened, so this is not just peculiar to Cardiff, if that is the case then they need to take a look at themselves - not the MOT stations.
It is also made to look worse than what it is because society has become more violent, and the downside is that drivers cars/cabs are getting kicked/battered by the punters = NOT UP TO STANDARD + one must look at the reasons of apparent failure! I believe that most will not be down to serious safety issues! the odd lighting issue, yes one or two re tyres (but that has always happened) and the rest will be cosmetic.
You have to take on board that they are basically saying that 1) MOT stations in general are corrupt, Or 2) the standard is not high enough! and are therefore challenging the the Department of Government that set the standards!
As far as I am concerned, if a standard has been set by a government department to cover vehicles...............then it has got to be good enough for Taxis/P.H vehicles.They are in essence accusing others (government authorised MOT stations) in multiple that they are bending the rules..............I cannot see that as their test is not a lot different and neither would they compromise their status .