Agenda item - Chair's Communications

 

RESOLVED: That the contents of the Chair’s Communications be noted

and received.

 

 

 

11.1    The Chair provided the following updates:

 

          Non-LA Committee Nov 2019

 

Electric Vehicle Taxi Rapid Charging Hubs

 

11.2    “The Trade have been consulted over possible sites for the 4 rapid charging hubs. The results of the survey were presented to the ETS Committee in Oct 2019 with installation scheduled for completed by April 2020. The chargers will be installed by Electric Blue, a company which has previously installed chargers in Cambridge, Oxford and Coventry. Their successful bid will mean that drivers can charge for 28p per kilowatt hour at slow, fast or rapid chargers in the city. We are consulting with UK Power Networks to establish whether there is sufficient capacity in the grid to install them at the preferred locations. If one or more of the sites is found not be suitable the council will re-consult with the taxi trade in line with the ETS report amended recommendations

 

Meanwhile, the 200 street lamp post electric charging points are to be installed by the end of January 2020 in areas of the city with no off-street parking.

 

A newsletter is being produced for taxi drivers considering switching to electric taxis. This includes information about grants available for chargepoints and towards the cost of an electric vehicle.  The Licensing Regulatory Manager added that there were 4 hubs with 6 rapid chargers per hub, thus making a total of 24 chargers currently. The rapid charges took half an hour to fully charge a vehicle.”

 

          Uber Licence revoked

 

11.3    “Uber has had its licence revoked in London due to issues over customer safety .  The Chair stated that they would be discussing this with the local Uber representative, Eugenie Teasely and asking TFL for details on their decisions.  She confirmed that unauthorised drivers had been uploading their photos and dismissed or suspended drivers had continued to drive.  Some drivers had been getting others to sit their test for them.”

 

11.4    Jim Whitelegg, Regulatory Manager stated that it was a shock to hear this about Uber in a TFL press statement on Monday and that he had written to both Uber and TFL to find our more details.  He confirmed that the main issue was how this would impact on Brighton & Hove and confirmed that the main issue was concerning a  technical vulnerability since 43 drivers had done 14000 unauthorised trips . Although this issue had been resolved, they would need clarification on how this would impact Brighton and Hove. 

 

11.5    Councillor Wares had seen Jim Whitelegg’s email and queried whether this was not covered by confidentiality.  The Regulatory Manager said that he was still waiting on a reply from Uber, who would take a while to gather evidence on this.

 

11.6    Councillor Wares asked how the Licensing team could ensure that responses were not being couched on behalf of Brighton & Hove drivers, since there are so many drivers in the city and would need to be satisfied. It was also confirmed as a valid point for drivers from Worthing.  In answer to Cllr Atkins’s question on the definition of an unauthorised driver, the Regulatory Manager agreed that he asked for clarification on this point to Uber.  The Legal Advisor stated that Uber did not renew licences for 15 months.  The Chair added that there whilst the appeal was going through, there would be an influx of drivers from outside the City.

 

Brighton Station update

 

11.7    The Chair then continued with the following update on Brighton station:

“It was confirmed that the taxi rank at Brighton railway station had relocated to a larger rank on Stroudly Road at the northern entrance to the station from 11 November 2019.

 

GTR’s own car park management contractor personnel are on site and they will be responsible for the issuance of manual penalty notices where applicable.  

 

The Council’s Taxi Licensing Team and civil enforcement officers have been monitoring the situation, particularly the roads around the station.

 

It is early days and a settling in period is needed. However, we are aware of some issues that have arisen since the introduction of the new rank and officers in Highways and Licensing are working together and liaising with GTR to try and resolve them.

 

The Chair then requested that GTR  respond to  investigate this and ETR to resolve problems of taxi rank.  She confirmed that she a number of  further issues including  a problem regarding family parking and disabled vehicles .  It would also mean a change to the entrance and signs.

 

Both Councillor Deane and myself asked for the ETS committee and relevant council officers to get involved in sorting this issue, as it was the ETS committee, specifically Gill Mitchell, that worked with GTR to resolve the issue of the taxi rank at the front of the station.  Mr Westwood, a council officer, has assisted in finding solutions to the majority of these issues ”

 

The Chair then read out what had been agreed:

 

“I can confirm that I have had a number of discussions with GTR on the legitimate issues raised by the trade following the movement to the north of the station.  In summary :

 

·       During the weekends rail replacement on Sunday a taxi rank will be created on Stroudley Road north of the mini roundabout

·       For any disabled passengers the GTR stewards will call down a taxi through the station car park to the area nearest to the station (disabled drivers parking area)

·       GTR will provide extra temporary signing

·       If this is successful the same methodology will used for the following weeks rail replacement services

 

General Rank Layout

 

·       The council is working with  GTR on removing the 20 min bays and moving public pick ups/ drop offs into the car park

·       The change will also include the removal of private hire taxis into the car park

·       GTR will be looking at the car park layout to facilitate this change

·       GTR will erect new signing to establish the north side of the station as a permit holders area (Hotel access and deliveries will be still allowed)

·       GTR will be erecting new signs at the entrance to the car park to reinforce that the drop off has changed and is within the car park

·       The council are committed to erect new signing on Billinton Way to facilitate this change

 

I think we are all hopeful that the more immediate concerns regarding the new rank will now be resolved.”

 

          The Regulator Manager then added that the key thing was that the land was not council owned and therefore the Council now has control. It’s a sea change for the taxi rank.  The big issues involved were a shared space of rank plus private vehicles and conflicting. Martin Seymour Hackney Carriage Officer confirmed that there was a meeting in 2 weeks time organised to make an improvement.

 

 

11.8    There was a discussion on the issues which included the Chair’s query on what was happening at the front of the station and Martin Seymour, Hackney Carriage officer confirmed that all drivers had been emailed and written to regarding the change to provide necessary time for drop off and pick up.  Councillor Deane asked how long this would remain a Licensing Committee issue since the rank was not council but privately run.  The Hackney Carriage officer said there would be little change in the procedures since it was still covered by the GTR.  Councillor Wares  said that the issue needed to be resolved from the perspective of the Constitution since the taxi trade had a relationship with the council who were pushing them to do this and it could potentially end in chaos if the taxi trade were not consulted.

 

Animal Licensing

 

11.9    The Chair stated that the new Animal Welfare Act which had been introduced in 2017 had created quite a bit of work for the council’s two Animal Welfare officers.  Indeed, they were so inundated with work earlier in the year that they reached out to Brighton Dogwatch, both a FB site for helping to find lost dogs and an organisation to further responsible dog ownership, to see if they could assist in paying for a qualified person to assess the stray dogs being held in the kennels, as neither of the Animal Welfare officers had time to do this and the kennels were at full capacity.  In fact the RSPCA took a number of the dogs and this eased the situation and Raystede Animal Centre also agreed to help. The Chair then thanked all those organisations for stepping in to help with what was a very difficult situation and hoped that the workload for the two Animal Welfare officers would now be more manageable.  She confirmed that Brighton Dogwatch had ran an extensive and successful campaign in 2016 to ensure that we replaced at least one of the Animal Welfare officers that were made redundant due to cuts in the service otherwise the service would not have coped at all.

 

11.10  The Chair then asked Nick Wilmot, Regulatory Services Manager Licensing to give a brief outline on the 2018 change in legislation. He confirmed that 22 licences had been issued that this number had decreased since before the Act due to the amount of officer time the process has taken and there were huge issues with regulation. The following breakdown was given:

 

·                10 -  Home Boarding of Dogs

·                6 -Selling Animals as Pets

·                2 - Cat Boarding

·                1 - Dog and Cat boarding

·                1 – Dog Breeding

 

These are given a star rating which dictates the length of their licence, for example a business that poorly performs but complies with minimum standards might be given a 1 star which would be a 1 year licence requiring re-inspection and re-application after one year, whereas a business that complies to a high standard might be given 5 stars and be given a 3 year licence.

 

 Licences were now issued to those who have made applications the service intends to start identifying and investigating those who are undertaking such activities without the benefit of a licence. A common approach and intelligence sharing initiative is being developed across all Sussex licensing authorities and is being developed in relation to this.

 

11.11  There was a discussion on this issue with the Chair raising the issue of dogwalker companies earning considerable sums but the Regulatory Manager said the biggest issues lay with online companies and whether they would qualify as a company under the new regulations. He added that these companies also required insurance which was not necessarily clear.

 

11.12  Councillor Atkinson asked about the size limit and number of dogs allowed and the Regulatory Manager replied that companies required insurance to regulate this. Most insurance for dog walkers would cover 6 – 8 dogs and there were restrictions on how they could be restrained.

 

 

          Members Training

 

11.13  The Chair confirmed that Licensing were hoping to arrange some members training early in the new year around Taxi licensing. Jim Button, expert on taxi training had been was booked for a training session on 11^th February.

 

11.14  RESOLVED: That the contents of the Chair’s Communications be noted and received.