Dear Fenland District Council,
WHEELCHAIR ACCESSIBLE TAXIS/PRIVATE HIRE VEHICLES (“WAVs”)-AVAILABILITY
This study is concerned with actual rather than notional availability of wheelchair accessible taxis and PHVs (“WAVs”). Individuals and some organisations can have great difficulty obtaining WAVs when and where required. As a generality, in rural/semi-rural areas or at schooltimes, on some evenings and on Sundays. This seeks to begin to clarify why this occurs and what does and does not work to improve the situation.
1. TAXI STATISTICS : How many a)wheelchair accessible taxis; b) other taxis c) wheelchair accessible phvs d) other phvs do you have licensed? This is to update the 2015 DfT statistics, the 2017 update is due shortly.
2. TAXI POLICY & PUBLIC SECTOR EQUALITY DUTY : FACTORS AFFECTING AVAILABILITY:
Typical factors affecting availability in a given licensing area are:
a) whether individual licensing authorities require a fully or substantially WAV fleet;
b) LA (eg SEN, schools, social care) and NHS (eg goods, staff ,NEPTS etc ) contracts;
c) not making all WAV operators booking/ contact details publically available;
d) operators refusal of prebookings;
e) operators refusal to carry wheelchairs;
f) drivers medical exemptions (wheelchair and assistance dog);
g) significantly more people relative to resident population eg commuters, tourists, passengers in transit;
h) private contracts, driver rest, vehicle repair and maintenance etc;
Please say if and how your taxi policy takes into account each of a)-h) above, or anything else relevant to try to ensure that sufficient WAVs are available to meet demand .*
3. CONTACT INFORMATION:*
To enable further research into accuracy, reliability, consistency and completeness of public and commercial information please provide a list/ spreadsheet/link etc showing the business contact details for all WAV operators with which your authority has dealings (eg as a Licensing Authority or contracting party including for Unitary Authorities, SEN, social services etc. In two-tier authorities please also state the contracting authority).
4. RAIL INDUSTRY : *
To obtain approval by the rail regulator, of their Disabled Persons Protection Policies (“DPPPs”) in order to meet the requirements of their operating licences, station and Train Operating Companies (“TOCs”) should know about WAV availability both for their own needs (rail disruption etc) and to inform passengers.
What arrangements if any have you made to inform them or to ensure that licensed WAV operators do so?
5. INFORMATION FOR TOURISTS , AIR/SEA/RAIL etc PASSENGERS IN TRANSIT ;*
Does your authorities information (including websites & social media) clearly tell the public:
a) the contact details for all WAVs licensed by your authority? If not, why not?; b)if and when WAVS are likely to be hard to obtain?;
c) that TAXI/PHV operators may charge extra etc to carry wheelchairs? (ie unless and until s167 is formally commenced).
6. COMPETITION.
Large authorities responsible for schools/SEN Transport can typically spend around £10m-£11m annually on taxis, including many WAVs .
Have you carried out or collaborated with any value for money studies on this? With what outcome?

Having discussed this matter with the ICO I wish to draw the following to your attention:
1. RE-USE OF INFORMATION PREVIOUSLY SUPPLIED
To minimise duplication I intend to re-use information on wheelchair accessible taxis/PHVs recently provided by your authority to Mr Doug Paulley in response to his Freedom of Information Request. This is for possible use by anyone interested in any way in disability and transport , including government, and is NOT for commercial gain.
2. *If providing the information in exactly the form requested is onerous, but is available in another easier to provide form (eg in a report or printed document) please say so as soon as possible.
Yours faithfully,
dick fowler

Dear Fenland District Council,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.

Dear Fenland District Council
Your ref FOI : not supplied. Reply dated 20 september 2017.
I am writing to request an internal review of Fenland District Council's handling of my FOI request 'Availability of Wheelchair Accessible Taxis/PHVs'.
Please clarify your response to Question 1 and respond to questions 2-6
Q1. Statistics.
You state that “(FDC) cannot provide statistics on this enquiry. Drivers are only at liberty to advise us if they are wheelchair accessible once we have licensed up to 278 hackney carriage vehicles and we are not near that figure.”

This presumably derives from FDCs published taxi policy entitled FENLAND DISTRICT COUNCIL: STATEMENT OF HACKNEY CARRIAGE & PRIVATE HIRE LICENSING POLICY & CONDITIONS . Approved by Full Council 12 May 2016 (effective from 3 January 2017, which I found on your website and which says:
“ Wheelchair Accessible Vehicle Specifications :Restriction on Numbers of Licensed Vehicles
6.2 The Council does not restrict the number of hackney carriage licences that it issues. Licence numbers. Hackney licenses issued, from 286 onwards must be wheelchair accessible vehicles.
First Registration
6.3 Any additional Hackney Carriage Vehicle licenses issued must be wheelchair accessible (plate 286 onwards) “

In the event DfT were commendably prompt publishing the following 2017 taxi/phv statistics: Fenland DC : WAV TAXI zero (out of 118 taxis/Hackey Carriages )and WAV PHVs zero (out of 36).

Your response above and the newly published DfT statistics (zero WAVs) are confusing as it seems that FDC have in fact already licensed Wheelchair Accessible taxis and PHVs (“WAVs”) and that the Councils Compliance Testers at least know which vehicles are WAVs and which are not . FDCs taxi policy states:
“Wheelchair Accessible Hire Vehicles
3.11 There are a number of wheelchair accessible vehicles available in Fenland which are licensed by the District Council.”

I take your FOI response to mean that existing license holders have not told you if their taxis/PHVs are accessible or not. However, the last section of the same FDC taxi policy (compliance testing) requires the councils compliance testers to check certain features which are specific to WAVs eg Ramps. So it seems that collectively, FDC should be aware of how many WAV taxis and also WAV PHVs they have already licensed but either the DfT Statistics unit were misled or they made a mistake in publishing zero WAVs.

Q2 a) to h) Taxi Policy and the Public Sector Equality Duty (PSED). This study of WAV availability is about more than total numbers licensed, nor does it depend on knowing exactly how many WAVs are licensed .

This is about other factors affecting availability which you may or may not have considered in your taxi/phv policy or as part of your Public Sector Equality Duties (PSED). This question seeks information about the influences which reduce or increase actual rather than notional availability.
Typical replies from other LAs comprise brief answers on each point, links to taxi policies, unmet needs studies, comments from disability bodies . Also the name of the County Council which arranges SEN and social services contracts which utilise licensed WAVs which means they are not available for hire at school etc times, though some LAs have answered this at Q3.

FDC are clearly aware of the PSED as the FDC taxi policy says :
“2.11 Fenland District Council wholeheartedly supports the principle of equality of opportunity in employment and service delivery and opposes all forms of discrimination on the grounds of the protected characteristics of the Equalities Act 2010.
And “3.12 The District Council welcomes views and information from the public regarding their needs for wheelchair accessible vehicles, the availability of currently licensed vehicles or what would help to provide an efficient ‘taxi’ service for people with physical disabilities..”

This is an opportunity for FDC to be specific about what it has taken into account to improve actual availability of WAVs which is the purpose of this study.

Q3 Is about WAV Taxi/PHV business contact information which you hold. Whether this information is made public is addressed separately at question 5c. I examined FDCs taxi/phv related application forms which expressly require personal and business names and contact phone numbers , also email addresses but often not social media contacts , so there is little doubt that FDC hold most of the information.

What is required please is to state whether the information is held or not, then either supply the information and/or state whether you are refusing to supply a) some of it or b) all of it , and on what exemptions you are relying.
Some LAs withhold information citing the Data Protection Act , or more specifically, s40 DPA , the personal data exemption. However, some LAs appear to be withholding information where the subject is an employee of a business, or is working for themselves under a business name.

Please also bear in mind that most taxi and phv operators openly publicise contact details variously on vehicles, on business cards, on commercial lists or websites and on social media. A key part of my study is to compare contact information from LAs, which should be reliable and up to date, with commercial sources which often are not with many defunct or wrong entries on commercial listings.

Q4 is about the rail industries need to know about availability of WAVs. Apart from providing WAVs to cover planned and unplanned rail disruption and inaccessible stations, train operators need to advise their passengers. For example I used the train operators taxi -finder to try to locate a WAV in March, Cambs. There were none so the trip had to be abandoned.

Q5 a) to c) Information about WAVs for (disabled) tourists etc . This is about whether and how you provide helpful information to the public, whether they are residents , or visitors who may choose to visit or avoid your area. A typical response includes links to public registers on the council website.

Q6. Competition. This is about any participation in value for money studies say in conjunction with a County Council which organises schools/SEN and social services contracts.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/a...

Yours faithfully,

Dick Fowler

Dear Fenland District Council,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of Information reviews.

I am writing to request an clarification of your internal review of Fenland District Council's handling of my FOI request 'Availability of Wheelchair Accessible Taxis/PHVs'.

Thank you for your reply of 4 October 2017.
I have had to guess what your cryptic replies to both my original request and to my request for internal review actually mean. In relation to Q1 Statistics, are you saying that, for whatever reason, FDC do not currently know how many WAVs are already licensed ? And that finding that out would cost too much (s12 FOIA) as it would require alteration to your computer software to capture the extra data about WAVs?

Having spoken to the ICO again about this:
1. You have ignored the footnote in my original request which I had discussed with the ICO at the outset and which read : “If providing the information in exactly the form requested is onerous, but is available in another easier to provide form (eg a report or printed document) please say so as soon as possible. “
2. Authorities are expected to be helpful to people making FOI requests.
3. You should supply the information requested which is NOT too costly to provide. I have now had 37 out of 40 LAs replies and only FDC have mentioned cost.
May I suggest that you proceed as follows:
Q1. Statistics. As it is too costly, leave this question and at Q3, supply a full list/printout of all approx 154 taxis and PHVs together with their business contact details (which you routinely receive when drivers/operators submit applications to you). Please read my previous comments if seeking exemption under the DPA personal data exemption. Incidentally the DfT confirmed that FDC submitted Nil (0) WAV returns , rather than a blank return in 2017.

Q2-Q6 . Should be failrly easy to respond to. Regarding Q2, FDC have evidently considered some aspects of WAV availability in setting the WAV taxi policy “6.2 The Council does not restrict the number of hackney carriage licences that it issues. Licence numbers. Hackney licenses issued, from 286 onwards must be wheelchair accessible vehicles.” As you have said “we are not near that figure” and only about 154 taxis/PHVs are currently licensed. The basis of this policy (an ‘unmet needs’ study?) would be relevant .

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is available on the Internet at this address: https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/a...

Yours faithfully,

Dick Fowler