Potential industrial action by taxi drivers opposed to the council's approach to the introduction of a clean air zone in the city centre has been delayed pending further discussions, it has been confirmed.
Last week the council's licensing committee published an update to their plans for a Clean Air Zone in the city centre, with particular emphasis on the arrangements around Hackney Carriage Vehicles (HCV).
According to city council figures, only 72 of the 1,265 Hackney Carriages licensed to operate in the city will be compliant with the new emission standards being imposed by the pollution charge from January 2020.
Following meetings last week the Rail and Maritime and Transport Union (RMT), which represents HCV drivers, announced a series of 'go slow' protests across the city centre, in protest at the costs being imposed on drivers to convert their vehicles to meet emissions standards.
However, following discussions on Friday (February 22), RMT representative Raja Amin said that the protests had been postponed after the council made some concessions on their proposals.
What concessions were made?
The update featured 12 points which represented a change from the council's original policy in relation to taxis.
These included :
- Removing the emission standard of Euro 4 and Euro 6 and replacing it with a 'strict vehicle ageing policy'.
- Increasing the age limit on HCV's from 14 to 15 years.
- Allowing any HCV that is less than 15 years old and any Private Hire Vehicle (PHV) that is less than 12 years old to work until such time as it reaches its age limit.
- Any vehicle that does not reach the standards would be able to keep working until they reach their age limit, but would have to pay the daily Clean Air Zone charge.
- Any HCV that is suitable for an LPG conversion can be converted regardless of its age, provided that its physical condition is structurally sound and it will last until December 2025.
A HCV will be able to carrying on working after 1st January 2020 if it has entered into a binding contract for an LPG conversion.
"Well as you saw, after the first 12 points were sent out last Wednesday we announced a dispute with Birmingham City Council and gave them some dates from Monday to Friday for two weeks where we’d drive slow in the area," he said.
"And we got prepared to start a dispute action from Monday. But Mr Chris Neville, the director of licensing, phoned me up on Friday afternoon and asked if we could sit around a table to resolve this, which we were quite happy to do as we made clear in our letter of dispute.
"So we sat down and five points were discussed, as well as one or two others, which he had to go and get ratified by his organisation before we could open. So that’s why the dispute has been postponed until further notice, because there’s a dialogue taking place.
"There’s no major difference between our belief and their understanding. They’ve been very open and honest with us, and we’re an organisation that are nationally recognised.
"On those lines he’s quite happy to talk to us - he said give me until Monday or Tuesday, so I’m going to wait until this evening, or at the latest Wednesday morning, to reconvene our meeting, and I don’t think there is a major sticking point.
"But then again there could be if he doesn’t come round to our way of thinking. The door’s open for both of us and we’re talking to each other."
What were the new points that were agreed?
The five new points agreed last Friday were:
- Agreement that if Birmingham is successful in its bid to government to be able to purchase a fleet of TX hackney carriages that priority will be given to older drivers who wish to hire them, given that they are less likely to be able to invest in the price of a new vehicle because of the limited period of time they would have to recover the cost of their investment.
- Agreement that drivers who have entered into a binding contract and paid a deposit towards an approved CVRAS LPG conversion will be exempt from the daily CAZ charge until such time that the conversion is completed (subject to a cut-off date to be agreed).
- Agreement to speak to the company that is authorised by CVRAS to install LPG retrofit conversions to discuss whether it can agree to accepting a 5 per cent deposit instead of 10 per cent to secure a conversion.
- Agreement to discuss with colleagues and relevant elected members in the council the request for drivers to be able to license for the first time Euro 6 diesels up until 2026, as opposed to the proposed date of January 1st 2021 (though it is noted that this is 'highly unlikely'.
- Agreement to discuss with colleagues and relevant elected members requests to allow all taxis to continue to be licensed after 1st January 2020 until the expiry of their licence, regardless of the age of the vehicle, and to be exempt from the daily CAZ charge during that period.
