Minutes:
The Assistant Chief Executive - Legal and Regulatory Services submitted a report regarding an application by Mr Stewart Forrester to licence a Vauxhall Meriva, vehicle registration number CE11 ZDL as a Private Hire Vehicle to seat four persons.
The applicant was present in support of his application and on inspecting the vehicle the Sub-Committee confirmed the mileage as being 21,389 miles.
The Sub-Committee was informed by the Licensing and Registration Officer that the vehicle is pre-owned and first registered at the DVLA on the 15th April 2011. The applicant provided a service history with his application.
The Licensing and Registration Officer informed the Sub-Committee that the particular make and model of this vehicle had not previously been submitted for licensing to this Council. The Authority had considered the Department for Transport’s Best Practice Guidelines in order to licence a wide range of vehicle types to meet the needs of customers, and for this reason the Authority had adopted minimum seating measurements for vehicles. This particular vehicle did not meet one of the current seat requirements, in that whilst the outer rear seats measured by Officers were 18” and met the guidelines, the middle rear seat only measured 16½” and the required width of the back seat from the squabs to the front edge must not be less that 17”. She explained that the length of the rear seat measured in a straight line over the majority of its length should be such as to allow adequate seating accommodation to the extent of at least 16” per person. However, the overall length of the rear seat measured 48½” and the middle seat distance between seat belt restraints was only 12½” across.
The Licensing and Registration Officer asked Mr Forrester if he accepted that there was a comfort issue regarding the measurement between the rear seats. Mr Forrester agreed that there was and advised that he had discussed the middle squab flexibility with the manufacturer who advised that the soft squab compresses when sat against to give the required 17”. The manufacturer also advised that the vehicle had been marketed as a five seater.
The Licensing and Registration Officer questioned Mr Forrester on the type of passengers he would be transporting in the vehicle.
Mr Forrester explained that as he worked week-days only the majority of his customers were single contracts, mostly elderly people, and suggested that the number of passengers would be more in the evenings and on weekends, and had checked with a few other drivers who confirmed that their profile would be similar. He advised that he would not be sub-contracting out the vehicle. He informed the Sub-Committee that he worked for a company called Driven, and handed Members a copy of his customer list, which analysed over a three week cycle the average number of passengers for each journey.
The Licensing and Registration Officer referred the Sub-Committee to paragraph 4.10 of the report and advised that the Authority could not licence a vehicle to a specific person, or specified type of work as licensed vehicles are regarded as public service vehicles. She referred the Sub-Committee to paragraph 4.11 of the policy and advised that the vehicle was not within the current age limit and therefore the application had been submitted for consideration of a relaxation of the policy.
The Sub-Committee retired to consider the matter and upon their return it was
RESOLVED: That the Sub-Committee, having inspected the vehicle, were not satisfied that a licence should be granted, due to the vehicle not being sufficiently comfortable to be licenced for a private hire vehicle. In support of this the Sub-Committee were not satisfied that Policy 4(c) and 4(d) of the Council guidelines had been complied with.
The Sub-Committee would have been satisfied to grant a licence on the grounds that although it did not meet the vehicle age requirement, that exceptional circumstances as to the condition of the vehicle had been shown.
The Sub-Committee reached its conclusion having inspected and viewed inside the vehicle.