Slough’s ‘excessive’ private hire fees to rise to double what neighbouring RBWM charges

Private hire operators in Slough will face an ‘excessive’ increase in the fees they have to pay – despite concerns that this will discourage drivers from wanting to work in the town. 

A new one-year licence for private hire operators wanting to set up their business in Slough  will increase from £153 to £600 – a 292 per cent hike.

The cost of renewing that licence, for an operator with one vehicle, will also increase from £153 to £548.

At a licensing committee meeting on Monday (March 9), councillors raised concerns that this is an ‘excessive’ increase that should have been done gradually.

Councillor Waqas Sabah (Lib Dem, Farnham) said: “Surely, we’d want the town to thrive, and we’d want more operators in the town. Not to discourage them by charging them fees which are double what our neighbours are charging.

“Considering the taxi trade in this town and currently what’s being offered to drivers or operators, the work is not there. We don’t have the high street; we don’t have those sorts of facilities.”

In the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead, a new private hire operator is charged £318 for both a new one-year licence and a one-year renewal.

A comparison to Manchester City Council, charging £2,790 for a new operator licence, and Portsmouth City Council operators, who pay £836, was also offered to councillors.

But Cllr Mohammed Nazir (Lib Dem, Manor Park and Stoke) said Slough is not comparable to any of these other ‘large’ city local authorities, which can charge thousands.

Russell Denney-Clarke, Slough’s trading standards and licensing manager, said he could not comment on what other councils have done to set their fees.

“If we could process [the applications] quicker than of course the fee would be different but at this moment in time it takes on average four-and-a-half hours to do the end-to-end of granting this licence and the additional cost.”

The hourly rate for an officer to assess the application, which includes monitoring and enforcement of the granted licences, is £103.

Officers have to visit the base of a new private hire operator and inspect it as well, the meeting heard.

Cllr Zafar Satti (Con, Chalvey) asked how many such licences the council has issued in the last few years.

Since 2020, 32 new operator licences were issued, and nine of these were in the current financial year, Mr Denney-Clarke said.

However, the council is ‘not allowed to make any profit’ from charging operators this fee, and the set hourly rate means the council can get a full cost recovery, the meeting heard.

Mr Denney-Clarke said: “Of course, it’s always good for there to be competition, but you do get to a saturation point [where] there may not be enough work for an operator to sustain themselves in this borough.

“Everyone’s got freedom of choice and if they decide they wanted to go to Windsor because their fee is more favourable, then that is up to that person.”

Cllr Ejaz Ahmed (Con, Slough Central) agreed and said the price of the fee is ‘reasonable’.

“The operator fee for the new [private hire] operators kind of also protects the existing operators,” he said.

“It sets a standard, you’ve got to have a minimum standard before becoming an operator.”