The hackney carriage and private hire trade representatives meeting is a forum to enable representatives of hackney carriage and private hire drivers and operators to meet on a regular basis with our officers from the Licensing Service and Greater Manchester Police (GMP).
Trade representatives attend meetings that are held every two months to raise matters on behalf of their members, directly with council officers and a representative from Greater Manchester Police.
Discussions can be on subjects ranging from changes in policy and procedures, to changes in relevant legislation, local issues or how improvements could be made.
If you'd like to raise something to be discussed at a meeting, please bring this to the attention of your trade representative.
Purpose of the taxi trade meetings
The purpose of the forum is to enable communication between our Licensing Service, GMP and the hackney carriage and private hire trade. Representatives may use it to seek information from Licensing or GMP, or to relay matters of concern on behalf of those they represent.
Our officers may use the forum to consult with representatives or discuss matters of mutual concern.
The Licensing Unit manager and/or Deputy Licensing Unit manager will act as a link between trade representatives and other officers or departments of Bury Council. This helps to facilitate better communication on matters relevant to the hackney carriage or private hire trade.
Taxi trade representatives
Representatives will be invited to attend the forum by our officers. Representatives will be required to provide written evidence to demonstrate who they represent and how they represent them.
Attendance is restricted to a maximum of two representatives, per organisation. If an organisation is not represented for three consecutive meetings, the organisation will be removed from the list of invitees.
The duty of representatives is to act as a channel to communicate information discussed at the meetings to their members.
Bury Council and Greater Manchester Police representatives
Our Licensing Service will be represented by officers employed by that service. Officers from other parts of the council may be invited to attend if it's relevant to the issues to be discussed.
GMP will be represented by officers employed by them. Other GMP officers may be invited to attend where it's relevant to the topics to be discussed.
The Chair of Licensing and Safety Committee and the Executive Cabinet Member for Licensing are also invited to attend the meetings.
Meetings and agendas
Meetings are held bimonthly whenever possible and are held for a maximum of two hours. Please note that there may be occasions when it's necessary to cancel a meeting due to operational reasons.
Meetings are arranged by our Licensing Service and are held at Bury Council premises or virtually via Microsoft Teams. Minutes are made at each meeting and are distributed at the earliest opportunity for comment. The minutes will be formally ratified and made public at the next trade meeting.
Representatives receive invitations to propose agenda items and are circulated two weeks before the next meeting. Representatives should submit agenda items at least one week in advance. Standard agenda items include:
- apologies
- notes and matters arising from the last meeting
- enforcement or service issues
- any specific subjects for discussion
- any other business
- date of the next meeting.
Each agenda item will be identified as either being for; information, consultation or discussion. An indicative time will be allocated to each item, to enable the meeting to be managed by the chairperson.
An action tracker will be circulated with the notes of the previous meeting and agenda.
Behaviour at meetings
All attendees are to conduct themselves appropriately, courteously and professionally. Everyone will be allowed to speak, subject to the time limitations of the meeting and the relevant agenda item. It is expected that attendees will treat each other with respect.
If the behaviour of any person at a meeting is questioned, the decision to allow that person to continue to attend future meetings will rest with the chairperson. The chairperson may ask a person to leave a meeting if their behaviour is considered to fall below the expected standard.
Decisions and chairperson
The chairperson of the meetings is the Head of Public Protection or any deputy appointed by them in their absence. The chairpersons role is to manage meetings effectively and to time, ensuring discussions are relevant to the agenda and to hold attendees to account for delivering actions.
The chairperson has the discretion to limit discussion, in order to conclude the meeting within the time allowed by the agenda, which includes the authority to curtail individual speakers.
Where there's disagreement concerning who may attend meetings or represent organisations at meetings, the final decision will be determined jointly between the Licensing Unit manager or Deputy Licensing manager and the chairperson of the meeting.