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 Post subject: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Mon Apr 22, 2019 8:00 pm 
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It was on your doorstep, Rutland licensed, but "operating in Aylesbury"

How were they "operating"?.... advertising? taking calls?

have we to stay within parish borders?

https://www.bucksherald.co.uk/news/ille ... -1-6152205

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 Post subject: Re: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Mon Apr 22, 2019 8:12 pm 
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Illegal cab firm finally brought to justice after two year court battle

A cab firm has finally been banned from Aylesbury’s roads and ordered to pay a hefty £25,000 following a two-year battle to get them off the streets. Call a Cab – also known as Easy Cabs – unlawfully operated under a Rutland County Council private hire licence which Aylesbury Vale District Council claimed was illegal.


It said cabs must be licensed by them to ensure they were subject to the same safety checks and regulations as other taxi firms in the Vale. After several twists and turns during a two year battle in the courts, a judge has finally convicted the firm and its boss Ahtiq Raja of operating without a licence.

Chairman of the licensing committee councillor Judy Brandis said: “This has been a protracted and costly prosecution but sends the strongest possible message that Aylesbury Vale District Council will challenge unlawful practices which undermine public safety, essential regulatory standards and fair competition. This was an important case and we are delighted with the outcome.”

In 2012, the district council prosecuted the firm for acting as a private hire operator without a licence from AVDC together.

However, the case collapsed on a legal loophole after Call a Cab argued that the council had not properly adopted the relevant provisions of the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1977.

The council had passed a resolution to adopt the provisions on March 8 1989 and was able to provide evidence of the newspaper advertisements, but it could not prove that notices had been sent to parish councils and meetings because its files had been destroyed.

For this reason, the court dismissed the council’s case.

However, in November last year the High Court allowed the council’s appeal and sent the case back to the Magistrates’ Court for reconsideration. This week Call a Cab was convicted of five offences of operating a private hire vehicle without a licence and its sole director at the time, Mr Raja, for aiding and abetting the commission of the offences.

District Judge Tim Pattinson decided that the additional evidence obtained by AVDC left him in no doubt that the appropriate notifications were made and that the resolution passed by the council in 1989 was valid. He had no hesitation in rejecting the defence that the company did not require a licence because it was acting as an intermediary, and imposed a fine of £2,500 each on the firm and Mr Raja.

Both the company and Mr Raja also have to pay a victim surcharge of £50 and prosecution costs of £20,000 in total. Judge Pattinson also noted that the firm had put the council to a great deal of expense and taken up valuable court time.

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 Post subject: Re: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Mon Apr 22, 2019 8:13 pm 
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Quote:
In 2012, the district council prosecuted the firm for acting as a private hire operator without a licence from AVDC together.

This has been going on 7 f***ing years. :shock:

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 Post subject: Re: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Tue Apr 23, 2019 8:51 am 
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I don't believe that our Council adopted the act correctly. I searched the local newspaper archives and found no advert for the adoption of the act at all. I just happened to mention this to one of our licensing people last week (I have mentioned it several times over the years) and she told me that this was being looked into by the Councils' solicitor at the moment. I bet it is because of this case.

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 Post subject: Re: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Tue Apr 23, 2019 10:20 pm 
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If they haven't adopted in accordance with the act, then that's going to cost them a lot of money.

43 years of unlawful licensing fees for a start.

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 Post subject: Re: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Wed Apr 24, 2019 7:40 am 
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Sussex wrote:
If they haven't adopted in accordance with the act, then that's going to cost them a lot of money.

43 years of unlawful licensing fees for a start.

The minutes from the meeting where they said they were going to adopt the act are from January 1981. I searched the local paper for the 6 months prior to that date and the 6 months after that date. There was no public notice in the paper.
When I was the trade rep I even mentioned it at a driver hearing when they were revoking his license. The panel, on the advice of the Council solicitor, ignored the point. Unfortunately, the driver decided not to appeal the decision at the magistrates court where we would have challenged the Council to produce the evidence that they had advertised in accordance with the requirements of the act.
Bryan with a Y was looking into some of these cases when he unfortunately died and no one else seemed up for the challenge so with no money to take the Council to court the whole thing got stopped.
When I was talking to one of our licensing officers last week I said that I was keeping this in reserve should I ever need it myself. This was when she said that the Council were looking into it.
Any idea where we would stand regarding past fees if they do decide to advertise the adoption of the act now?

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 Post subject: Re: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Wed Apr 24, 2019 11:45 am 
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grandad wrote:
Sussex wrote:
If they haven't adopted in accordance with the act, then that's going to cost them a lot of money.

43 years of unlawful licensing fees for a start.

The minutes from the meeting where they said they were going to adopt the act are from January 1981. I searched the local paper for the 6 months prior to that date and the 6 months after that date. There was no public notice in the paper.
When I was the trade rep I even mentioned it at a driver hearing when they were revoking his license. The panel, on the advice of the Council solicitor, ignored the point. Unfortunately, the driver decided not to appeal the decision at the magistrates court where we would have challenged the Council to produce the evidence that they had advertised in accordance with the requirements of the act.
Bryan with a Y was looking into some of these cases when he unfortunately died and no one else seemed up for the challenge so with no money to take the Council to court the whole thing got stopped.
When I was talking to one of our licensing officers last week I said that I was keeping this in reserve should I ever need it myself. This was when she said that the Council were looking into it.
Any idea where we would stand regarding past fees if they do decide to advertise the adoption of the act now?



I think you may have an argument about private hire fees and licensing of same but TAXI fees I think you are stuck with.


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 Post subject: Re: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Wed Apr 24, 2019 9:00 pm 
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Quote:
I think you may have an argument about private hire fees and licensing of same but TAXI fees I think you are stuck with.

A driver in an area which hasn't adopted the 1976 act properly would be able to recover any fees unlawfully charged, be they hackney vehicle/driver or PH vehicle/driver/operator licenses.

The only question mark would be on hackney drivers licenses as they don't need to be advertised, thus could get away with going back to the 1847 act to cover those fees.

As for the rest the council would have advertised any increases in accordance with the 1976 act. An act they might not have legally adopted.

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 Post subject: Re: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Wed Apr 24, 2019 10:16 pm 
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What i was trying to ascertain was, how were the company "operating" in Aylesbury?

Adverts/website which can be seen across a border cannot qualify as operating, taking bookings out of your area but using vehicles/drivers licensed IN your area breaks no rules

So did they have an office or landline in Aylesbury?

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 Post subject: Re: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Thu Apr 25, 2019 1:46 pm 
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Sussex wrote:
Quote:
I think you may have an argument about private hire fees and licensing of same but TAXI fees I think you are stuck with.

A driver in an area which hasn't adopted the 1976 act properly would be able to recover any fees unlawfully charged, be they hackney vehicle/driver or PH vehicle/driver/operator licenses.

The only question mark would be on hackney drivers licenses as they don't need to be advertised, thus could get away with going back to the 1847 act to cover those fees.

As for the rest the council would have advertised any increases in accordance with the 1976 act. An act they might not have legally adopted.

We do, of course have duel hackney/Private Hire drivers badges.

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 Post subject: Re: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Thu Apr 25, 2019 4:38 pm 
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Am I missing something big here, or is it relevant that the linked article posted by Wanna was published on 1 July 2014 and posted on here by Captain Cab back then :-s

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=24651


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 Post subject: Re: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Thu Apr 25, 2019 10:05 pm 
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StuartW wrote:
Am I missing something big here, or is it relevant that the linked article posted by Wanna was published on 1 July 2014 and posted on here by Captain Cab back then :-s

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=24651



This was raised elsewhere citing the firms prosecution but im only interesting HOW the firm was deemed to be "operating" in an area they were not (it seems) licensed for, or at least the cars/drivers were not.

We all take jobs from over the borders we are licensed within.

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 Post subject: Re: Grandad.....
PostPosted: Fri Apr 26, 2019 5:01 pm 
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wannabeeahack wrote:
This was raised elsewhere citing the firms prosecution but im only interesting HOW the firm was deemed to be "operating" in an area they were not (it seems) licensed for, or at least the cars/drivers were not.

We all take jobs from over the borders we are licensed within.


Yes, my point was more about the suggestion that the press article was a recent one, and to that degree the case had dragged on longer than it actually had.

But indeed there's nothing in the reports to suggest what the operator thing was about, precisely, and can't find anything else online to shed any light.

For what it's worth, I'd guess that the scenario was pretty bog standard, and that the defendant just came up with the 'intermediary' idea to get round the need for a licence in Aylesbury Vale, which would have obviously been inconvenient with the cars plated in Rutland. Which I think is why the 'intermediary' argument seems to have been given short shrift, reading between the lines.

Even the report on the Local Government Lawyer website isn't a whole lot different from the one in the mainstream press, although there was this about the procedural argument, which may or may not be relevant to the stuff on this thread about licensing fees etc.

Local Government Lawyer wrote:
However, a district judge accepted the defendants’ argument that Aylesbury Vale had failed to carry out the correct procedures in 1989 when the authority sought to adopt the private hire controls in Part 2 of the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1976.

The judge ruled that a failure to notify 12 out of 112 parish councils in the district meant that the Act had never been validly adopted.

A two-judge Divisional Court upheld Aylesbury Vale’s appeal in November 2013.

Mr Justice Ouseley concluded that the defendants had suffered no prejudice because the 1976 Act did not require notification to them, but to the parish councils.

The judge also said the district judge should have considered the degree to which there had been ‘substantial compliance’ with the procedural requirement.


The case was sent back to the Magistrates’ Court for reconsideration.


https://www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk ... of-licence

The full judgement is available at the link below. Can't be bothered reading that, but from what I can see there's nothing obvious that might shed light on what the 'operation' of the PHVs was all about, and it's all about the procedural point regarding the adoption of the Act and the requirement for notification etc.

https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ad ... /3765.html


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