Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the remarks made by Earl Howe on 22 May where he stated that they plan to "engage stakeholders on the proposal set out in the levelling up White Paper to explore transferring the responsibility for licensing taxis and private hire vehicles to upper-tier and combined authorities" during the course of this year, when they intend to initiate that process.

The Department for Transport intends to carry out engagement on this issue early next year.