Stafford Borough Council outlines new taxi licensing policies through to 2030
- Perry Richardson
- Jul 15
- 2 min read
Stafford Borough Council has unveiled a revised taxi licensing policy that aims to modernise the borough’s hackney carriage and private hire regulations. The updated policy, covering the period from 2025 to 2030, was presented to Cabinet on 7 July 2025 and will go before full Council later this month for formal adoption.
The key changes include a phased move towards carbon neutrality, a tightening of driver suitability standards, and proposals to maintain the viability of wheelchair-accessible vehicles (WAVs) within the local fleet.
Emissions and vehicle standards
Central to the new policy is a timetable to remove vehicles powered solely by internal combustion engines (ICE) from the licensed fleet. From April 2026, the Council will begin refusing licences for Euro 4 diesel and petrol vehicles. Euro 5 vehicles will be phased out between April 2026 and March 2027. From April 2028, ICE vehicles presented for the first time will no longer be accepted, with all ICE vehicles due to be removed from the licensing system by March 2030.
Only electric, hybrid, or hydrogen-fuelled vehicles will be licensed beyond that point. The Council has reserved the option to review dates should market or supply issues require it.
Driver suitability and training
The policy strengthens the Council’s approach to assessing whether drivers are “fit and proper” to hold a licence. It introduces more explicit criteria aligned with national guidance, including the use of the National Anti-Fraud Network database to cross-check applicants and licence holders. The Council will use a “balance of probabilities” test and adopt the standard question: “Would you allow a person for whom you care to travel alone in a vehicle driven by this person?”
Mandatory safeguarding and disability awareness training, including for drivers of WAVs, must now be completed within six months of initial licensing and renewed every three years. All drivers must also subscribe to the DBS update service for continual criminal record checks.
Operator and vehicle licensing changes
Private hire operators will be required to submit updated driver and vehicle lists quarterly. There will be three licence bands for operators based on fleet size. Operators must also clearly notify passengers when journeys are subcontracted to vehicles not licensed by Stafford Borough.
For vehicles, new limits have been introduced to ensure only models up to a set age and emission standard can be licensed. All newly licensed vehicles must meet Euro 6 standards as a minimum.
Trade proposals under review
The Council has received several proposals from the local trade, which are still under consideration. These include:
Allowing hackney carriages to be black as well as white, due to long delays in sourcing white vehicles
Extending the ICE phase-out deadline from 2030 to 2035, in line with some hybrid exemptions under national rules
Offering hackney carriage proprietors who operate WAVs for eight consecutive years the option to switch to a saloon vehicle licence
A final decision on these points will be made when the policy is presented to Council on 22 July.
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