Taxi Driver Online

If it wasn't for Eastbourne Borough council's failure to adopt Section 76 of the public health act 1925 we might never have had the analogy of the soliciting prostitute within the confines of a house? Nor would the Watford case have been prosecuted under the Eastbourne judgement, in fact there is every likelihood that the Watford case might have replaced Eastbourne as being the most significant plying for hire judgment for some considerable time.

In the case of Eastbourne it was observed that the whole of the proceedings would have been unnecessary if the Eastbourne Borough Council had adopted s. 76 of the Public Health Act 1925 (as it had in fact been at liberty to do at any time). Statutory powers in respect of these matters are made applicable to cars "standing or plying for hire at any railway station or on any railway premises within such areas, as if the railway station or railway premises were a stand for hackney carriages on a street".

Pill LJ commented:

Litigation in the High Court can be avoided in cases concerned with unlicensed private hire vehicles plying for hire from taxi stands on railway premises if an authority adopts s 76 of the Public Health Act 1925. That section provides: ‘In any area within which the provisions of the Town Police Clauses Act 1847 with respect to hackney carriages are in force, those provisions and any bylaws of the local authority with respect to hackney carriages shall be as fully applicable in all respects to hackney carriages standing or plying for hire at any railway station or railway premises within such area, as if such railway station or railway premises were a stand for hackney carriages on a street.’
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