Agenda and draft minutes

The Democratic Services Officer advised the meeting of the procedure.

Apologies were received from Councillor Michael Evans, for whom Councillor Sally Davis substituted.

At this point in the meeting declarations of interest are received from Members in any of the agenda items under consideration at the meeting. Members are asked to indicate:

(a) The agenda item number in which they have an interest to declare.

(b) The nature of their interest.

(c) Whether their interest is a disclosable pecuniary interest or an other interest,  (as defined in Part 2, A and B of the Code of Conduct and Rules for Registration of Interests)

Any Member who needs to clarify any matters relating to the declaration of interests is recommended to seek advice from the Council’s Monitoring Officeror a member of his staff before the meeting to expedite dealing with the item during the meeting.

There were none.

There was none.

These were approved as a correct record and signed by the Chair.

The Committee is asked to consider passing the following resolution:

“The Committee having been satisfied that the public interest would be better served by not disclosing relevant information, RESOLVES in accordance with the provisions of Section 100(A)(4) of the Local Government Act 1972, that the public shall be excluded from the meeting for the following items of business and the reporting of this part of the meeting be prevented under Section 100A(5A), because of the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in paragraphs 1 and 2 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Act, as amended.”

The Sub-Committee, having been satisfied that the public interest would be better served by not disclosing relevant information, RESOLVED in accordance with the provisions of Section 100(A)(4) of the Local Government Act 1972, that the public should be excluded from the meeting for the agenda item 8, and that the reporting of this part of the meeting should be prevented under Section 100A(5A), because of the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in paragraphs 1 and 2 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Act, as amended.

The Chair explained the procedure to be followed for the next item of business.

The licensee confirmed that he understood the procedure to be followed for the hearing.

The Senior Public Protection Officer presented the report. He explained that the licensee had twice failed to comply with the condition of his licence requiring him to produce to the Licensing Section a new MOT certificate within seven working days of the expiry of the previous certificate. It was noted that on the latest occasion there had been a gap in MOT cover of seven days from the expiry of the old certificate to the issue of a new certificate. He was awarded 4 penalty points, warned that a subsequent failure would result in the matter being referred to the relevant Council Sub-Committee and asked to submit within seven days a written explanation of the gap in cover. He failed to submit a written explanation and failed to reply to two further letters asking him to submit an explanation within seven days. No letter of explanation had been received, and accordingly he had been referred to the Sub-Committee.

The licensee stated his case. He said that he had deliberately not replied to the letters because he wanted to come before the Sub-Committee to address Members directly about his dissatisfaction with the absence of a taxi rank in his area. Without a rank he had to keep driving round and round wasting fuel. He had tried to speak to Public Protection and various Council departments about this without success. The Chair advised him that this was not an appropriate forum in which to raise this matter; the Sub-Committee could only deal with the matters set out in the report.

In reply to questions from Members the licensee stated that at the time the MOT certificate had expired he had asked his driver Mr BH to attend to the matter, but the driver had gone on holiday for seven days and had not done so.  The licensee further stated that when Mr BH returned from holiday, he had again directed him to attend to the matter, and he done so as soon as he had returned. The licensee again referred to his frustration at the lack of a taxi rank in his area.

The Licensing Officer explained to the Sub-Committee that following a request to Cathryn Brown regarding the provision of the existing taxi rank in his area, the Council had looked into the matter and decided that in the absence of any documentation from the former Wansdyke Council legitimising the existing taxi rank the best course of action was for B&NES to formally adopt the existing rank.  This process was implemented, and a public notice was issued for consultation and in the absence of objections the taxi rank was formally appointed. As far as licensing was aware Highways had installed the required markings and signs and the licensee was aware that this process had been completed following his request.  The licensee stated that Highways had done some work and that the new rank was there from  ...  view the full minutes text for item 70.