Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham says England’s ‘broken taxi system’ must be fixed to make his city-region’s fleet amongst the safest and most trusted in the country. It comes as figures show one local authority dominates licensing, with almost half of Greater Manchester’s private hire vehicles now licensed ‘out of area’.
Having brought buses under local control in January as part of the Bee Network, Mayor Burnham has now called for radical change to give England’s mayors and city-regions more control of private hire vehicles.
Launching a new campaign ‘Backing our taxis: Local. Licensed. Trusted.’ in Manchester city centre, he outlined the call for the government’s English Devolution Bill to both devolve power on taxis to Mayoral Combined Authorities and put a stop to ‘out of area’ licensing.
Such a legal change would tackle a problem affecting many regions. Flexibility in licensing laws means vehicle owners are not required to obtain a licence from the local authority where they operate - severing the link between taxi drivers and local communities, through accountability to councils.
Mayor Burnham says such local accountability is critical to ensure public safety and trust in taxis as an essential part of the transport system. He says the move would not only help drive up standards, but also better support the livelihoods of Greater Manchester’s taxi drivers through control of numbers and better incentivisation.
Aligned to what’s been done on the city-region’s Bee Network buses – where local control has driven up standards and in turn passenger numbers – the Mayor wants more control on enforcing safety, vehicle standards and accessibility conditions on taxis. He also says a clearer link between Greater Manchester Police and licensing authorities would allow for swifter investigation into incidents and collisions where a taxi is involved.
It comes as figures show that more than 11% of England’s private hire vehicles are licensed by one local authority, City of Wolverhampton Council, up from below 0.5% less than a decade ago.
In Greater Manchester, nearly half (49%) of private hire vehicles are now licensed by authorities outside of its ten councils. The city-region’s out of area figure of more than 12,000 has risen sharply from just under 7,000 in 2023.
Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, said:
“Taxis are a crucial part of our transport network. Just as we set out to with Bee Network buses, we want our taxi fleet to be amongst the safest and most trusted in the country. But we can’t do this with the current broken licensing system. Local leaders have zero oversight over nearly half the private hire vehicles on our streets, with no relationship with the drivers, no levers to enforce the standards we want and no control over the numbers of taxis serving our communities.
“We want to guarantee our residents that if they’re getting in a Greater Manchester taxi – no matter how they book it – it’s one that meets high standards we expect across all public transport. To do that, we need national change in the English Devolution Bill to both devolve taxi powers to city-regions and stop the ability for vehicles and drivers licensed in non-GM authorities to operate here. Such a change will give political leaders more control over measures that impact public safety, vehicle standards, emissions and accessibility.
“But this is as much about making Greater Manchester the best place to be a taxi driver – and safeguarding the livelihoods of our cab drivers – as it is about passengers. They’ve been under immense pressure over the last few years, and we want to get behind them.
“We’re today kickstarting in-depth discussions with the trade. We want to get under the bonnet of the issues that affect them, review how we can improve our own licensing and incentivise them to register here without dropping standards. We’re committed to doing what we can under the current system, but it will only be effective if it’s done in lockstep with change on out of area licensing at a national level.”
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