Taxi Driver Online

JD has actually hit the nail on the head. Stockport is poorly placed for de-regulation. The "Quality" controls are below third world standards.

The council leader is on record, a lib/dem, Cllr David GOD dard as wishing to de-regulate, and as his committee has a majority, he may try and push this through.

SODA have consulted the usual experienced lawyers and will try for an injunction & Judicial review if the Council suddenly do a complete reversal of it's policy after 21 years.

It would not seem so bizarre if they had not spent (the council) £43k on a useless MORI poll and then a further £15k on defending (and losing) a court case relying on the poll, and now an estimated £20k on the TPI survey which says there is no unmet demand.

You could bet they wouldn't throw this money around if it came from their own pockets.

Manchester trade reps are assisting because Stockport could indeed become Manchester's very own "Berwick" It could also impact on the Salford decision due soon.

If Salford de-reg as well, it would effectively de-reg Manchester. So if anyone has anything to offer at this late stage please post away on here. or pop on down to the clown hall tomorrow at 6pm.

I'm surprised we only found out about this meeting last night however the options open to the Stockport Taxi trade are limited.

Taking the Watford ruling into account a council after consultation with stakeholders including the taxi trade can change their policy as they see fit. The key element here is consultation, I don't know what if any consultation took place in this case but the council should be made aware of the law if in fact there was no consultation.

If the council do change their policy and no consultation has taken place then a judicial review will probably echo the Watford judgement and only serve to delay matters. That might be a lifeline of sorts if it gives the Stockport taxi trade time to present a strong case for retaining the current policy.

The issue which arose in Watford was whether there had been a decision at a committee meeting on 5 September to delimit the number of hackney carriage licenses to be issued and whether that decision was taken unlawfully?

Watford TGWU in the shape of Mr Sardar argued that, even if the effective decision to delimit was taken at a later committee meeting on 20 October 2005, the consultation which took place between the last meeting on 5th September and 20th October was ineffective as it was not undertaken at a time when proposals were still at a formative stage.

The court found that the description "a formative stage" might be apt to describe a number of different situations. An authority might only have reached the stage of identifying a number of options when it decided to consult. On the other hand, it might have gone beyond that and have identified a preferred option upon which it might wish to consult.

In other circumstances it might have formed a provisional view as to the course to be adopted or might 'be minded' to take a particular course subject to the outcome of consultations. In each of those cases what the authority was doing was consulting in advance of the decision being consulted about being made.

It was no doubt correct that, if the authority had a preferred option or had formed a provisional view, those being consulted should be informed of that so as better to focus their responses.

The fact that an authority might have come to a provisional view or have a preferred option did not prevent a consultation exercise being conducted in good faith at a stage when the policy was still formative in the sense that no final decision had yet been made.

It was, however, a difference in kind for it to have made a decision in principle to adopt a policy and, thereafter, to be concerned only with the timing of its implementation and other matters of detail.

*In this case, having regard to the totality of the evidence, the authority on 5 September took a decision in principle to de-limit.* Further, the policy of delimitation, by virtue of that decision, ceased to be a policy which was at a formative stage.

**There had been consultation prior to the decisions of 20 October, but that consultation failed the condition that consultation had to be both substantively fair and have the appearance of fairness.**

Although what was done after 5 September was done professionally and in accordance with the requisite standards, there was a residual feeling that the decision to delimit had not been taken in a fair way.

At tonight’s meeting the taxi trade should be professional and respectful in their attitude and dispense with any rowdiness. A coherent argument should be put forward as to why there is no urgency to make such a decision at this time and that further exploration of any new policy is a vital requirement in order that councillors can be informed of the advantages and disadvantages of any policy change.

The point should also be raised that the recent court cases were brought about because of a failing on the councils part to comply with the law in respect of measuring demand and that their Mori questionnaires year on year fell far short of the legal requirement for establishing unmet demand. In addition it should be stated that this failing was brought about through a lack of understanding by the licensing officer who in turn provided this committee with wrong information as to the standard of market research acceptable by law.

It can then be stated that the correct procedures have now been established by the TPI survey which will underpin the current policy for a number of years to come. When considering this element of the equation it would be unreasonable for the committee to make a hasty decision on any new policy amendment without further exploration of the consequences such a decision might have on the many elements associated with the Stockport taxi park. It would therefore be prudent to take a step back and consider the prospect of any new policy in light of the proposed accumulated evidence.

I think a stay of execution is probably the best approach if there are negative vibes regarding deregulation.

Regards

JD

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True or false.. I do not know .... But I was told that the cheer of the licensing committee had his car covered in brake fluid... and is blaming the Hackney Trade, I wonder if he will declare he has an interest..

PS... that is very good advice by JD..

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Justice for the 96. It has only taken 27 years...........repeat the same lies for 27 years and the truth sounds strange to people!

I wonder if he'll bother with a respray.

CC

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Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.
George Carlin

Unfortunately its true.

Whether that will play a factor in the decision making remains to be seen.

I suppose he's not very happy about it but perhaps the culprit was someone who wanted the councillor to believe it was a member of the local hackney carriage trade?

Regards

JD

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Unless the culprit is apprehended, he will never know for sure.

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http://wingsoverscotland.com/ http://www.newsnetscotland.com/

Thats right but I get the feeling that the incident in question could be the tip of a very large iceberg.

Regards

JD

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Or can of DOT 4

CC

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Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.
George Carlin

I can't confirm this as yet but I've heard a decision has been made to change the policy, to what I don't know?

Regards

JD

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There's a rumour going around that the tyres were also slashed.

I suppose soooner or later these rumours will escalate to a point where the whole car was vandalised.

Regards

JD

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Does it not have to go to a full council for a change of policy or have the committee delegated powers?

regards

CC

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Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.
George Carlin

I would have thought it would go to the full council but I think every committee decision can be called in regardless of delegated powers.

Regards

JD

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Copyright notice © The contents of this post are copyright of JD and are not to be reproduced outside of TDO without written permission.

Wow, I wonder what the change is.

I don't even know the true facts, the information I got was second hand. I could be very wide of the mark.

Regards

JD

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Copyright notice © The contents of this post are copyright of JD and are not to be reproduced outside of TDO without written permission.