Action on Taxi Cross Border Reform: ‘The last thing we need is out of town drivers flooding in’ says LTDA
The ongoing challenges within the UK’s taxi and private hire vehicle (PHV) licensing system have resurfaced, as the Labour Government hints at a potential shake-up. This recent wave of political interest comes in response to longstanding issues raised over half a decade ago, including cross-border hiring, safety concerns, and the lack of consistent national standards.
For Steve McNamara, General Secretary of the Licensed Taxi Drivers’ Association (LTDA), the renewed attention to these issues might offer hope—but also frustration.
McNamara recalls his involvement in the Department for Transport’s 2017 Task and Finish Group, which gathered diverse industry voices to assess the gaps in taxi and PHV licensing. The group’s 2018 report proposed several changes designed to tighten the system, emphasising the need for enforceable national minimum standards and better control of cross-border hiring. This framework, McNamara argues, would enhance safety, support local businesses, and protect drivers’ livelihoods.
Yet, under successive Conservative governments, these recommendations saw little progress. Instead, the Government rolled out Statutory Standards and Best Practice Guidance. While these initiatives covered some regulatory ground, they failed to resolve the core issues identified by the Task and Finish Group—leaving gaps in enforcement and creating regional discrepancies in licensing requirements.
The crux of the problem, according to McNamara, lies in two areas. First, the absence of a legally enforceable, nationwide standard enables some authorities to apply lower criteria for determining if a driver is “fit and proper”. Secondly, and closely related, is the practice of “out of area working”, where drivers obtain licences from jurisdictions with lower entry barriers and operate elsewhere. This, he highlights, has become more visible in London, where PHVs licensed from areas like Wolverhampton are working the streets, creating logistical challenges and exacerbating enforcement difficulties.
With the ball now in Labour’s court, the industry waits to see if this new government will finally implement practical reforms to tackle out-of-area licensing and strengthen national standards, moving beyond past efforts that merely scratched the surface.
McNamara said in TAXI Newspaper: “Back in 2017, I was asked to join a working group set up by the Department for Transport to look at Taxi and PHV licensing and how to improve it. The Task and Finish Group, as it was called, included lots of different industry representatives and an independent chair.
“In 2018, it produced a report setting out a number of ways the government could improve the current system, ensure passenger safety and make sure it worked for industry and protected drivers' interests too. These recommendations included the need for national minimum standards and action on cross- border hiring. We’ve been calling on government to adopt and implement them ever since...
“Under the Conservatives, it was ‘never the right time’. Instead, they introduced Statutory Standards and Best Practice Guidance – some of it good and some of it bad, especially when it comes to penalty points and driving offences! None of this has solved the two main problems the Group highlighted.
“The first is that unless we have national minimum standards, which are legally enforceable, there will always be authorities that use lower standards to decide whether a driver is ‘fit and proper’ to be licensed. This raises the second issue, which is that there will always be drivers and operators looking to exploit the cross-border hiring provisions to get a licence in one authority (where it is easier) but work in another licensing area, known as ‘out of area working’.
“We’ve all seen the Wolverhampton plated PHVs on our streets on the weekend and back when Uber was battling TfL for a licence, it was Brighton plates. With over 100,000 PHVs already licensed and working in London, the last thing we need is out of town drivers flooding in, making things worse. It also raises serious safety concerns and enforcement challenges.
“With a new group of MPs keen to make their mark in Parliament, we are suddenly hearing lots of noise about these issues again. This is good and it seems like the Labour government is looking to finally take action to address them. But, it does make me laugh to see all these new faces talking about these issues, like they are the first people to ever bring them up. It makes you see the lunacy of a system where every time the party in power changes or the leader of that party changes, it’s back to square one on everything.
“I’ve written to the MPs and the Government on this and will be making sure everyone is aware of the Task and Finish Group’s report and that instead of trying to re-invent the wheel, they get on with actually solving the problem.”
