Burnley taxi driver made 1,500 pick ups without a licence

Burnley taxi driver made 1,500 pick ups without a licence

7:00am Saturday 6th March 2010


A TAXI driver who picked up hundreds of passengers despite having no licence has been banned from driving for a year.

Iftikhar Ul Haq, of Ardwick Street, Burnley, pleaded guilty to the charges of acting as an unlicensed private hire driver and driving with no insurance, during a hearing at Manchester Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday.

He was fined £75 for driving without a licence, £175 for having no insurance, and ordered to pay £500 costs for both offences, while magistrates also disqualified him from driving for 12 months.

Manchester City Council licensing officers investigated the 41-year-old driver after one of his passengers complained he used his mobile phone throughout a journey last October.

Ul Haq provided officers with false information about who was driving the vehicle, leading them to contact the private hire company he worked for.

They then discovered he had carried out nearly 1,500 booked jobs through the operator since the previous May, despite having no private hire licence during that period.

Ul Haq's private hire licence had been revoked by the city council in May after he was convicted for illegally picking up passengers in Stockport.

When asked to return his badge to the city council, Ul Haq claimed he had lost it.

Councillor Richard Cowell, Manchester City Council’s Executive Member for the Environment, said: “Mr Ul Haq knew he was putting his customers at risk as their journeys were not insured, but thought he could get away with it.

“We always prosecute private hire drivers we find breaking the rules with no regard for the safety of Manchester passengers, and as this case shows, they face severe punishments.”


http://www.burnleycitizen.co.uk/news/5045453.Burnley_taxi_driver_made_1_500_pick_ups_without_a_licence/

We had a bloke here in Sheffield who didn't renew his cab licence and kept driving for a while before the Council officers caught up with him. I believe his licence was taken off him for good, as he hasn't been seen on the ranks again since. So this sort of thing goes on everywhere, but thankfully only a small minority.

Too many knowit-alls that the trade can do without. One less idiot on the road, so well done Licensing.

stf wrote:Too many knowit-alls that the trade can do without. One less idiot on the road, so well done Licensing.

Are you referring to the guy in the news item or the one I mentioned from Sheffield stf?