Agenda item

At this point in the meeting, Members of the public who have registered their wish to speak regarding an item on the agenda or an issue within the Committee’s remit can do so.  The deadline for registering is 5pm on Thursday 7^th June 2007.

It was reported that there had been five registrations to speak on Agenda Item 4 (Taxi Vehicle Standards – Emissions, Livery and Luggage Capacity) under the Council’s Public Participation Scheme.

Mr Usher, a York taxi driver, objected to the proposals for the minimum age of a vehicle. He had recently purchased a top of the range 6 year old BMW which was frequently commented upon by customers as being a very comfortable car. He felt that it was unfair that a top of the range car, that met Euro 3 Emissions Standards, should be outmoded once it reached 8 years old.  A four year old car would be more expensive and therefore mean that a lower model or standard of vehicle would have to be purchased.

Mr Rowley, the secretary of the York Taxi Association agreed the image of the Hackney Carriage Trade in York would benefit from some fine tuning but he thought that  the changes proposed in the report were unreasonable. He felt that a fairer system regarding the age of Hackney Carriages would be on at 5 years and off at 9 years.  He told the Committee that there was evidence that dark coloured cars were involved in more accidents and suggested that white or silver would be a better colour for a standard livery if one were to be adopted. The loss of advertising would affect the livelihood of many drivers and he pointed out that the business of the Hackney Carriage Trade was already in decline but Private Hire trade was on the increase.

Mr Robertson, Vice-Chair of the York Taxi Association, said that whilst wanting to improve the standards of Hackney Carriages generally he felt that younger vehicles had a higher depreciation and dark coloured cars needed more cleaning. He felt that it was unfair to ask one sector of the trade to take all the proposals on board. He also felt that the trade was acting responsibly and trying to improve standards by funding a marshalled taxi rank at the racecourse on race days.

Mr Bulmer, a local taxi driver said that they all had strong views on emissions. He thought that the least safe colours for cars were brown, black and green and he felt that Hackney Carriages were already clearly marked. He suggested that there should be a Government grant to help finance any changes that were implemented.

Mr Taylor, a York taxi driver, said that he had purchased a purpose built vehicle for wheelchairs that was very costly. He felt that there would be no need to get rid of this after 8 years and he would lose out financially if he had to replace the vehicle this early.

Councillor Taylor made representations on behalf of the Green Party and said that the report missed the mark. He said that taking cars off the road due to their age was environmentally inefficient and not a sustainable way of achieving the best results. The report suggested an arbitrary age for vehicles to cease being taxis and the Council should be looking towards rejecting petrol and diesel and looking towards alternative fuels. New technologies were coming out all of the time and these needed to be explored. The Council must work with the taxi companies and drivers and set a reasonable time limit to work to. He believed the colour of the taxi was irrelevant.