Changes to the Taxi and Private Hire driver policy
Request ID: FOI-0760-2223 Date published: 13 July 2022
You asked
“Can you please supply copies of any correspondence (email, letter, text, whatsapp or other electronic communication, between the TPH policy team and any TFL or GLA employee or elected or appointed person concerning the recent revision and changes to the Taxi and Private Hire driver policy. Can you also supply any correspondence(same definition as above) from any outside person, group or Association relating to the new policy”
We answered
Our Ref: FOI-0760-2223 Thank you for your request received on 24 June 2022 asking for information about changes to the taxi and private hire policy. Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act and our information access policy. I can confirm we do hold the information you require. Unfortunately, to provide the information you have requested would exceed the ‘appropriate limit’ of £450 set by the Freedom of Information (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004. Under section 12 of the FOI Act, we are not obliged to comply with a request if we estimate that the cost of determining whether we hold the information, locating and retrieving it and extracting it from other information would exceed the appropriate limit. This is calculated at £25 per hour for every hour spent on the activities described. We have estimated that it would cost over £450 to provide a response to your current request. This is because it is estimated that it would take in excess of 18 working hours to retrieve and compile the information you have requested. Some changes to the Taxi and Private Hire Driver Policy have been in discussion for several years and would likely capture a significant number of pieces of correspondence. We would need to identify what correspondence was captured by your request and then manually review it all to determine whether it was relevant to your request. To help bring the cost of responding to your request within the £450 limit, you may wish to consider narrowing its scope so that we can more easily locate, retrieve and extract the information you are seeking. For example, if there is a specific element of the driver policy that you are interested in then this may narrow any search we would have to do. You might also consider limiting your request to a particular period of time. By their nature, emails contain a significant amount of personal data such as phone numbers and email addresses and so, whilst this process of redaction does not feature as part of our considerations on whether the cost limit might apply, the burden created by non-specific requests for emails is significant and this should be borne in mind before submitting requests of this nature. It is likely that we would be able to provide information on specific questions that you have rather than correspondence on a wider topic. If you want to refine your request or make a Freedom of Information Act request in future, please bear in mind that the Freedom of Information Act allows you to request recorded information held by us. You should identify the information that you want as clearly and concisely as you can, specifying the types of document that you are looking for. Although your request can take the form of a question, rather than a request for specific documents, we do not have to answer your question if it would require the creation of new information or the provision of a judgement, explanation, advice or opinion that was not already recorded at the time of your request. Please note that we will not be taking further action until we receive your revised request. In the meantime, if you have any queries or would like to discuss your request, please do not hesitate to contact me. Please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to appeal. Yours sincerely Gemma Jacob Senior FOI Case Officer FOI Case Management Team General Counsel Transport for London
