Hackney-carriage Licences for Private Cars O N several occasions we have
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been asked our opinion as to the possibility of licensing private cars as hackney carriages. Obviously, the idea is an endeavour to escape from paying the additional horse-power duty which falls due on any vehicles put into service on January 1, 1990. Apart from strongly decrying such a scheme as an evasion which is unpatriotic and leaves others to bear the burden, we have taken legal advice in order to help solve the problem.
• Our advisers have carefully considered this matter and have come to the definite conclusion that it is not possible to license private cars as hackney carriages.
In the first place, an application for a licence would have to be made to the local council, which has the power to limit the number of such licences to De issued in its locality. If a hackney:arriage licence be obtained, the car must exhibit the customary plate showng that the vehicle has been licensed is a hackney carriage and is available as such for hire by the public.
This latter contingency might prove extremely awkward and disastrous to the owner of the vehicle. Supposing that he is waiting for a friend at a railway station, and a member of the public hires the vehicle on the assumption that it is plying for hire, the owner of the car cannot refuse to take such a person, unless he can prove that he • was already hired by some other person or waiting for such a person. Failing this, and if he did refuse, he might be subject to prosecution, when the whole system would .be exposed.
It may be that some of our readers have other views upon this matter, particularly on the point as to whether the mere carrying of a hackney-carriage plate would enable any person to demand the use of a vehicle if it were not previously engaged. Apart from this question, however, there would appear to be many difficulties in the way, and any attempt to carry the scheme into practice should be strongly discouraged.