Taxis and Private Hire Vehicles (Safeguarding and Road Safety) Bill (First sitting)

Shaun Bailey Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd November 2021 Public Bill Committees

[Sarah Champion]

I begin by thanking the hon. Member for Darlington for bringing forward the Bill. It is much needed and very sensible. Of course, I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge for all the work that he has done and thank the hon. Member for Wealden (Ms Ghani). When she was the Minister for this subject area, she was going to bring forward some more comprehensive taxi legislation. I hope that the present Minister will consider the work that she has done and consider finding time to bring that forward.

My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for South Swindon spoke about the long relationship that we have had on this topic, and I want to bring a bit of that to the debate, so that everybody, but particularly the Minister, knows why this legislation is so important. I learnt about taxi licensing because Rotherham Council got it horribly, horribly wrong. I am delighted to say now that because of how wrong we got it and because of Government intervention, we now have some of the highest standards in the country. That is important because taxis, by their very nature, tend to be transporting, in a real position of trust, some of the most vulnerable people in the country. It is taxis that are commissioned to take children to school, and to take children and adults with special needs to where they need to be. We put our most precious loved ones into the back of a cab, on the assumption that the person will take as much care with their transportation as we would. Sadly, as we discovered in Rotherham, that was not the case. Children were known for their vulnerabilities, picked up because of that and exploited—sometimes in the taxi by some of the taxi drivers. But sometimes they were being commissioned from place to place and taken by the taxi drivers to do it. And they were doing all this in plain sight, because taxis, by their very nature, are transporting vulnerable people around, so it was not discovered in time.

[Shaun Bailey (West Bromwich West) (Con)]

I am so grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way and thank her for raising the SEND issue. We had a bad issue in Sandwell involving a SEND transport contract that was handed out, and safeguarding requirements not being met. Is she as hopeful as I am that the new database could be used in procurement by local authorities? That will be really important, as I am sure she agrees, in ensuring that our most vulnerable—particularly those with special educational needs, for example—are protected when they are being transported to where they need to go.