Taxi Driver Online

New taxi drivers will be forced to take English and safeguarding test to work in Nuneaton and Bedworth

New taxi drivers will be forced to take an English and safeguarding test to work in Nuneaton and Bedworth.

Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council wants to introduce the tests for those who are want a taxi drivers' licence.

It will cost £35 and all new applicants will have to undertake training and testing to get their licence to operate across the borough.

Councillor Kyle Evans, cabinet member for public services, explained why they were bringing in the tests.

"We want to ensure that residents in this borough, who use taxi drivers, are safe," he said.

"We have had nunerous incidents in other local authorities, particularly councils like Rotherham where we have had some really bad cases of child sexual exploitation and I am not going to accuse taxi drivers in Nuneaton and Bedworth of anything like that, we have some great taxi drivers and I know that as a member of the licensing committee,

"But I do think it is really important that we have those safeguards in place within the system to make sure that our tax drivers are fit to serve the pubic and that is going out to a public consultation."

Cllr Andy Sergeant raised concerns about adding extra financial pressure on cab drivers, who he says have struggled during the pandemic.

However, the proposals were agreed.

What will the test entail?

An English test
Numeracy test
Local knowledge test (may be different for taxi and private hire)
Wheelchair users training
Users with assistant dogsSafeguarding training - test to includeAdults safeguarding vulnerable passengers, elderly passenger, disability awareness, recognising non visible disability, Child Sexual ExploitationEqualities / disability training

The applicant will be given three attempts to complete and pass the training programme. If the they fail any element of the tests three times, they will not be allowed to book onto the training programme for a period of twelve months.

Each element must be passed and retests will be allowed on specific elements of the training which have been failed following retraining on the element if appropriate. Should applicants fail the English or Numeracy tests then applicants can seek and undertake training by an external organisation themselves before resitting the test.

The council has said there may be occasions when it requires an existing licensed driver to complete and pass one or more of the training modules. This may be the result of a substantiated complaint, for example, about the standard of English, the standard of driving, the standard of customer care, attitude of the driver or if the licensing authority believes that a driver’s standard of driving or behaviour falls below the standards required.

What happens next?

The council will carry out consultation with the trade, public and any other relevant groups about the plans.

Depending on this, the new tests will come into force.

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IDFIMH

FFS.

so behind the times

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

Looks like whoever wrote the above sentence needs an english language test too.

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Former taxi driver

Or maybe someone on the newspaper having a bit of an ironic laugh

But these online versions of traditional newspapers certainly seem a lot more error-prone than their 'dead-tree press' counterparts.

actually almost 100 percent of newsprint is produced from recycled paper no trees are killed during it's production

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

Having licensed drivers that can understand and converse in English.

Whatever next?

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IDFIMH