Request:
- Please provide me with a list of all Hackney Carriages currently licenced by the Council. For each vehicle, please provide the following:
a. Hackney Carriage plate number;
b. Registration Number (for vehicles that are owned by corporate entities (e.g. ltd companies) only);
c. Date registered with the DVLA;
d. Vehicle make and model;
e. Vehicle colour;
f. Number of passengers carried;
g. Is the vehicle wheelchair accessible?; and
h. Names of all current proprietors. I believe you can provide this information as this is contained in the public register of Hackney Carriages you are statutory required to make available to enquirers.
- Please provide me with a list of all Private Hire Vehicles currently licenced +by the Council. For each vehicle please provide the following:
a. Private Hire Vehicle plate number;
b. Registration Number (for vehicles that are owned by corporate
entities (e.g. ltd companies) only);
c. Date registered with the DVLA;
d. Vehicle make and model;
e. Vehicle colour;
f. Number of passengers carried;
g. Is the vehicle wheelchair accessible?;
h. Does the vehicle hold a limousine exemption?;
i. Names of all current proprietors (for vehicles that are owned by
corporate entities (e.g. ltd companies) only); and
j. Name of the operator/office the vehicle is working for e.g. Radar,
Blue Line, East Coast Taxis.
3. I would also like you to provide me with a list of all current holders of
Private Hire Operators Licences issued by the Council. Please can you give me the following information for each licence holder:
a. Name of the licence holder (business or trading name only, I do not need the name of the person(s) holding the licence);
b. Business/office address (I do not require the residential address of the licence holder(s));
c. Business telephone number;
d. Business email address; and
e. Date the licence was granted and date it will expire.
Response
The information requested in questions 1c, 1f, 2c and 2f are not held in an easily extractable format. To provide the requested information, over 800 recordswould need to be manually accessed.
To provide the information requested over 800 records would need to be checked. A sample exercise determined it would take over 5 minutes to check one case file, which means to check every record would take in excess of 60 hours.
Therefore, this request is refused under section 12 (1) Freedom of Information Act 2000, since the cost of complying would exceed the appropriate limit set out in the Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004.
In assessing the cost of complying, the costs attributable to officer time involved in complying have been considered. Such costs are limited to £450.00 under the Regulations, which equates to eighteen hours of officer time.
Under this provision, the Authority can advise some information you require is already publicly available on the North Tyneside Council website here: https://my.northtyneside.gov.uk/category/883/vehicles. Other information, such as business office address, telephone number and email address can be found via the contact pages of each private hire operator.
The Authority considers that no further information requested can be disclosed under the Freedom of Information Act. More information on this decision can be found on the North Tyneside Council website here: https://my.northtyneside.gov.uk/category/816/disclosure-log