Issue - meetings

A report by the Assistant Director (Localities) is attached.

1.    It was requested that the hearing for Licence Holder 32/2017 be adjourned until the next meeting, which was agreed by the members of the Licensing and Safety Panel.

2.    Licence Holder 33/2017 did not attend the meeting and it was reported by the Licensing Unit Manager that several attempts to contact the Licence Holder had been made via email, telephone, and letter.  Two officers of the Licensing Service had been to the Licence Holder’s address on that afternoon and it was apparent that no one was currently in the property and there was an apparent backlog of post behind the front door.  The Father of the Licence Holder, also a Licence Holder in Bury, is known at present to be in Pakistan and it is unknown if the Licence Holder has gone with him.  After further investigations with local private hire operators, it was concluded that this Licence Holder is not currently driving for any operator in Bury.

Following an in-depth discussion with the members of the Licensing and Safety Panel, it was decided, on a majority decision, to hear the case for Licence Holder 33/2017 in absence.  Although it was agreed that the Licence Holder was not present to defend himself, the Panel considered the complaint serious enough to hear in his absence and there had been sufficient attempts to make him aware of the meeting and requirement to attend.

The Licensing Unit Manager presented a report submitted by the Assistant Director (Localities), which explained that on 12 December 2017 the Licensing Service received a complaint from a concerned

Parent, that Licence Holder had been contacting her daughter excessively, without permission and using inappropriate language.

The complainant’s daughter, who is over 18, had been out in Rochdale and used her mobile phone to contact the Licence Holder’s operator in the early hours of Saturday 9 December 2017, to book a private hire taxi.  The complainant’s daughter had received an initial text from a mobile number advising her that her taxi was waiting outside.

Subsequently, between 09.37am and 12.30pm later the same day, her mobile received 7 phone calls and 5 text messages, 14 audio calls and 20 messages through the WhatsApp messaging service, with one stating ‘Ur hot u’.  Through Whatsapp, the complainant’s daughter was able to view the profile of the sender and she identified him as being the taxi driver who had taken her from Rochdale earlier that day and the mobile number was the Licence Holder’s, the same number she had been notified of the arrival of her taxi in the early hours.

A witness statement and screen shots of the phone activity were attached to the report for the Panel’s consideration.

                    Delegated decision:    

                    The Panel carefully considered the report in respect of Licence Holder 33/2017 and taking into account the Council’s Conviction Policy and Guidelines and in accordance with the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1976, resolved, unanimously, to revoke the driver’s licence.

                        The Panel noted the following:

1.   The Licence Holder had  ...  view the full minutes text for item 439