Crawley Borough Council May 2017
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Crawley Borough Council May 2017 Unmet demand survey i Unmet demand survey ii Executive Summary This Unmet demand survey has been undertaken on behalf of Crawley Borough Council following the guidance of the April 2010 DfT Best Practice Guidance document, and all relevant case history with regard to unmet demand. This executive summary draws from the main report the salient points regarding this independent database of evidence to enable Councillors to conclude regarding the present policy of limiting hackney carriage vehicle numbers. The survey began with our appointment in January 2017 and the subsequent inception in early February. On the ground interviews and rank observations occurred in March 2017, with trade views obtained in late March and early April. Key stakeholder views were obtained through the period of the survey. This report is being presented to Councillors in June 2017. Crawley is a district authority with highway and transport powers at the County level. As is typical, the background transport policy has little reference to licensed vehicles apart from that Station Travel Plans are sought. A period of no limit on hackney carriage vehicle numbers apart from the impact of quality control requiring all new vehicles to be wheel chair accessible had the main impact of increasing WAV levels to the current 43%. Recently there has been growth in numbers of operators and private hire vehicles. Rank observations found abuse by private vehicles of ranks, but little other abuse. The level of WAV activity at ranks mirrored the proportion in the fleet. Although only one person was seen using a wheel chair to access vehicles at ranks during the survey, a targeted exercise found inconsistent service to those needing to travel in wheel chairs which needs action. Although only Three Bridges station rank is active at all times and days, the Boulevard and the Jubilee Oak ranks still make significant contributions to passengers needing hackney carriages in the area. The Bus station and Station Way night ranks are both still used, but not to a great extent. While overall demand has stayed about the same, this seems to have become more focused at the top three ranks, and more so at Three Bridges. This ‘standing still’ in terms of overall demand for hackney carriages is against a national trend of continued decline. There appears to be a good level of spare capacity in the fleet operating, particularly late at night. Overall public usage of licensed vehicles is low, with that for hackney carriages even lower with a very high proportion of people unable to remember the last time they used a hackney carriage, although very few had never seen them. Unmet demand survey iii Rank knowledge which was fairly poor did not match usage, although half those mentioning ranks said they used them. There is general satisfaction with the service provided and low latent demand. Key stakeholders tend to use private hire and get confused between ranks and private hire offices. Trade response was good and identified a high level of experience. The working week was low compared to other areas, a symptom of the overall low level of demand. The private hire and hackney carriage trades are relatively separate and though many hackney carriages take telephone bookings they still tend to get most fares from ranks. There was strong support for retaining the limit on vehicle numbers, including from the private hire respondents. The industry standard ISUD index result was negligible albeit increased from three years ago in most aspects. Other influences on usage of hackney carriages were mixed, with fares not having changed, but increased competition from bus service improvements. On the contrary, the difference between private hire and hackney carriage fares appeared to have reduced. The overall conclusion is that evidence supports retention of the current limit on vehicle numbers at the present level. However, action is needed to ensure service is available to those needing to travel in wheel chairs, particularly at Three Bridges station. Unmet demand survey iv Contents Executive Summary .................................................. ii Contents ........................................................................ iv 1 General introduction and background ........... 1 2 Local background and context .......................... 5 3 Patent demand measurement (rank surveys) 11 4 General public views ............................................. 23 5 Key stakeholder consultation ............................ 27 6 Trade stakeholder views ..................................... 31 7 Impact of other options on use of hackney carriages 35 8 Evaluation of unmet demand and its significance 41 9 Summary, synthesis and study conclusions 45 10 Recommendations ............................................... 51 Unmet demand survey 1 1 General introduction and background Crawley Borough Council is responsible for the licensing of hackney carriage and private hire vehicles operating within the Council area and is the licensing authority for this complete area. It retains a limit on the number of hackney carriage vehicles licensed. There is no legal means by which either private hire vehicle numbers, private hire or hackney carriage driver numbers, or the number of private hire operators can be limited. Crawley took off its limit on vehicle numbers in 2002. Following a survey in 2011, the limit was returned, and this policy was again tested by survey in 2014. This review of current policy is based on the Best Practice Guidance produced by the Department for Transport in April 2010 (BPG). It seeks to provide information to the licensing authority to meet section 16 of the Transport Act 1985 “that the grant of a hackney carriage vehicle licence may be refused if, but only if, the licensing authority is satisfied that there is no significant demand for the services of hackney carriages within its local area, which is unmet.” This terminology is typically shortened to “no SUD”. Current hackney carriage, private hire and operator licensing is undertaken within the legal frameworks set by the Town Polices Clause Act 1847. This has been amended by various following legislation including the Transport Act 1985, Section 16 in regard to hackney carriage vehicle limits, and by the Local Government Miscellaneous Provisions Act 1976 with reference to private hire vehicles and operations. Many of the aspects of these laws have been tested and refined by other more recent legislation and more importantly through case law. Beyond legislation, the experience of the person in the street tends to see both hackney carriage and private hire vehicles both as ‘taxis’ – a term we will try for the sake of clarity to use only in its generic sense within the report. We will use the term ‘licensed vehicles’ to refer to both hackney carriage and private hire. The legislation around licensed vehicles and drivers has been the subject of many attempts at review. The limiting of hackney carriage vehicle numbers has been a particular concern as it is often considered to be a restrictive practice and against natural economic trends. The three most recent reviews were by the Office of Fair Trading in 2003, through the production of the BPG in 2010, and the Law Commission review which published its results in 2014. None of these resulted in any material change to the legislation involved in licensing. Unmet demand survey 2 The upshot of all these reviews in respect of the principal subject of this survey is that local authorities retain the right to restrict the number of hackney carriage vehicle licenses. The Law Commission conclusion included retention of the power to limit hackney carriage vehicle numbers but utilizing a public interest test determined by the Secretary of State. It also suggested the three- year horizon also be used for rank reviews and accessibility reviews. After introduction of the 1985 Transport Act, Leeds University Institute for Transport Studies developed a tool by which unmet demand could be evaluated and a determination made if this was significant or not. The tool was taken forward and developed as more studies were undertaken. Over time this ‘index of significance of unmet demand’ (ISUD) became accepted as an industry standard tool to be used for this purpose. Some revisions have been made following the few but specific court cases where various parties have challenged the policy of retaining a limit. Some of the application has differed between Scottish and English authorities due to some court cases in Scotland taking interpretation of the duty of the licensing authority further than is usual in England and Wales. The DfT asked in writing in 2004 for all licensing authorities with quantity restrictions to review them, publish their justification by March 2005, and then review at least every three years since then. In due course, this led to a summary of the government guidance which was last updated in England and Wales in 2010 (but more recently in Scotland). The BPG in 2010 also provided additional suggestions of how these surveys should be undertaken, albeit in general but fairly extensive terms. A key encouragement within the BPG is that “an interval of three years is commonly regarded as the maximum reasonable period between surveys”. BPG suggests key points in consideration are passenger waiting times at ranks, for street hailings and telephone bookings, latent and peaked demand, wide consultation and publication of “all the evidence gathered”. The most recent changes in legislation regarding licensed vehicles have been enactment of the parts of the Equality Act related to guidance dogs (sections 168 to 171, enacted in October 2010), the two clauses of the Deregulation Act which were successful in proceeding, relating to length of period each license covers and to allowing operators to transfer work across borders (enacted in October 2015), and most recently enactment of Sections 165 and 167 of the Equality Act, albeit on a permissive basis (see below). Unmet demand survey 3 In November 2016, the DfT undertook a consultation regarding enacting Sections 167 and 165 of the Equality Act.