Taxi drivers are worried that a surge in the number of private-hire drivers is saturating the market, driving down the price of fares and reducing the number of passengers picked up by each driver.
Government figures show that the total number of licensed taxi and PHV vehicles and driver licences in England continued their long-term upward trend, reaching 313,000 and 381,100 respectively on April 1. The Department for Transport found that the increase since 2023 has been driven by a 10.5% rise in the number of PHVs, reaching 256,600. The number of taxis has also decreased over the same period by 1.4% to 56,400.
Blame
As drivers are understandably concerned about their futures, the GMB union has put the blame for the number of PHV drivers flooding the market on City of Wolverhampton Council, which has become a favourite for “out-of-town” drivers because its charges are less than other authorities and it processes applications quickly.
The BBC reports that number of licensed vehicles in the West Midlands increased by 20.1% between 2023 and 2024, mainly due to a large increase in Wolverhampton, a trend that has been seen year on year since 2017.
To highlight the issue, GMB found that Wolverhampton issued 8,563 new taxi badges in the first five months of this year – more than 30 times higher than neighbouring Birmingham Council, which issued 277 badges during the same period, and Solihull, which issued 239.
Since changes to legislation in 2015, private hire drivers do not have to live and work where they obtain their badge and figures have shown that up to 96% of the taxi driver badges issued in Wolverhampton in the 2023-24 financial year were for drivers who lived elsewhere.
In its defence, Wolverhampton told the BBC it could not refuse applicants because they lived in a different area.
A spokesman said: “While City of Wolverhampton Council has never actively encouraged applications from drivers outside the city, existing legislation requires that if an application is submitted and requirements are met, then the application must be granted.
“Applicants have always been able to apply to any licensing authority for taxi licences and the council cannot refuse an applicant simply because they live in a different area.
“It is illegal for licensing authorities to impose a limit on the number of private hire licences it issues.
“As a council, we support further standardisation, however, legislation is required to introduce any changes and the council is not in control of this.”
Saturation
But it is the sheer number of new badges coming through that is concerning drivers, who worry there will be less work to go around.
The authority told the BBC that “it was not for councils, but private hire vehicle operators, and in many cases the drivers themselves who set fares, and therefore incomes”.
But GMB organiser Kate Gorton said: “Wolverhampton’s private hire licence dominance is a well-documented phenomenon.
“The fact remains that private hire badges give thousands of working people their income every month, including GMB members across the Midlands.
“More and more drivers report a flooded marketplace is pushing down income.
“The imbalance between supply and demand is meaning drivers are waiting for longer between jobs and are forced to compete with inflated competition.
“Wolverhampton bosses rightly point out barriers to capping application – but we’ve got one council essentially issuing licences for the rest of the whole region.
“The saturation of the market threatens the entire industry.
“We need urgent action to ensure standardisation across licencing authorities, in terms of price, testing and timescales and Wolverhampton has a key role to play in making sure that happens.”
