Transport for London opened a consultation on 17 July 2026 proposing that from autumn 2026 it would issue no new licences for salvage vehicles used as taxis and private hire vehicles, and asking how quickly the vehicles already licensed should be phased out. It closes on Sunday 13 September 2026. This article is our response to it, published in full so that drivers can read the argument, disagree with it, and make their own submission before the deadline.
We should say at the outset why we are writing.
About this response
This article is the opinion of Blackties Rentals. We have tried hard to get it right: the statutory references and the case citations were checked against the primary sources, and the quotations from TfL's consultation and from its Inspection Manual are reproduced as published. We are not lawyers, this is not legal advice, and on a document of this length dealing with licensing law there may still be errors. Any that remain are ours, they are made in good faith, and we would rather be corrected than be wrong. Tell us and we will amend the page and say that we have.
Where we have set out questions about lawfulness, they are questions we think TfL should answer in the record of its decision. They are not assertions that the proposal is unlawful, and nothing here should be read as advice to anyone about their own licence or vehicle.
Our interest, declared up front
Blackties does not run salvage vehicles. We hold our cars to the highest standard. The salvage proposal would not remove a single vehicle from our fleet.
The honest position is that a ban would help us commercially. Remove several thousand cheaper vehicles from the London private hire fleet and demand moves up market. It moves towards operators whose cars were never in that category. We would be one of the beneficiaries.
We are opposing it anyway, and we would ask TfL to weigh that. This is a submission against our own commercial interest, made because we think the proposal as published rests on a hypothesis rather than on evidence, and because it would dismantle a control that TfL itself built and still operates.
If TfL publishes data showing that licensed salvage vehicles fail, break or crash at a materially higher rate than comparable licensed vehicles, we will withdraw this objection publicly and say so on this page. That offer is genuine and it is unconditional.
What TfL is actually proposing
The firm proposal and the open question are frequently run together. Before arguing about the proposal it is worth stating precisely what is on the table.
The firm proposal
There is one firm proposal. TfL puts it like this: "If you are thinking of purchasing a salvage vehicle for use in the fleet, we are proposing from autumn 2026 we would not issue any new licences for such vehicles."
That is prospective. It is about new licences.
The open question
The fate of vehicles already licensed is not a decision. It is a question TfL is asking. The consultation says: "We are considering how long we should keep salvage vehicles that we know of in our fleet. Your views on this are welcome." And: "The aim of the proposals is to have no salvage vehicles in the fleet. We would like to know your views on how quickly we should aim to achieve this."
TfL has not decided to strip existing licences. It has asked how quickly the aim should be achieved, and it has asked openly. We take that at face value and answer it directly later in this article with a specific transition proposal.
The numbers
TfL puts the affected population at 35 taxis and 3,520 private hire vehicles, so 3,555 vehicles in total, which it describes as "just over 3%" of roughly 107,000 licensed vehicles.
Three per cent is a small share of the fleet. It is also several thousand vehicles, every one of which TfL inspected and licensed.
Credit where it is due: TfL already controls this
The central weakness of the proposal is not that TfL is doing something new. It is that TfL is proposing to replace something it already does, and the consultation does not mention the thing it already does.
TfL's Taxi and Private Hire Vehicle Licensing Inspection Manual, version 20, March 2026, is published at content.tfl.gov.uk/vehicle-licence-inspection-manual.pdf. Section 1, DOCUMENTS, at 1.1 Vehicle Registration Document, pages 10 to 11, sets out a specific salvage gateway.
First, salvage is a coded pass or fail item at inspection. The examination column lists as check item 10: "There is no evidence the vehicle has been salvaged on the V5C or V5 document". The paired reason for refusal column lists at item 10: "There is evidence the vehicle has been salvaged on the V5C or V5 document".
Second, there is a referral route. The manual says: "Where reference is made to the vehicle having been salvaged because of structural damage, within the special notes section on page 1 of the V5C document, the vehicle should be referred to the VPT for review." VPT is defined in the manual's own abbreviations table on page 7 as the Vehicle Policy Team.
Third, there is an engineering evidence route. The manual provides that "The licensee may be required to submit an independent engineer's report in relation to the repairs carried out which must be completed by an appropriately qualified engineer and containing specified information for review and authorisation by VPT before progression through the licensing regime can be considered."
We are quoting that carefully and we would ask readers to note the word "may". The report is not automatic. But where it is required, the manual makes the quality of it mandatory: it must be completed by an appropriately qualified engineer and must contain specified information. Authorisation by the Vehicle Policy Team is required before progression through the licensing regime can be considered. TfL, not the seller and not the owner, holds that decision.
Fourth, there is an ongoing check. The manual continues: "Once a vehicle that has been deemed salvage and subsequently authorised by VPT, to allow future licensing, licensees may be requested to provide evidence no further salvage incidents have occurred since the previous incident via a vehicle history check report."
Fifth, TfL has already required the physical means to look at exactly the thing it says it is worried about. On page 8, under legislative and other requirements, the manual states that inspections must be carried out at authorised sites "allowing access to all equipment required to complete the inspection appropriately, including the ability to carry out an underside vehicle inspection if necessary", and that full vehicle inspections "may only be conducted inside of a TfL approved workshop where there is access to a vehicle ramp to facilitate an underside inspection of the vehicle if required."
We are not claiming every vehicle is put on a ramp at every inspection. The manual requires the capability and permits the inspection where necessary. That is still directly responsive to TfL's stated concern.
Sixth, and separately, these vehicles are tested more than ordinary cars. The manual's introduction on page 6 states that all taxis and private hire vehicles "more than 12 months from date of manufacture are required to pass two MoT tests as a condition of continued annual licensing", with the first certificate issued not more than fourteen days before the licensing inspection, and, for those vehicles that require an MOT at the time of licensing inspection, a second MOT obtained six months from the date of grant of licence. That sits on top of TfL's own annual licensing inspection.
So the current position is this. A repaired structural salvage vehicle in the London fleet has been flagged on a coded inspection item, referred to a specialist TfL team, potentially subjected to an independent qualified engineer's report on the repairs, authorised by that team before licensing could proceed, and, where it is more than 12 months from date of manufacture, is then subject to MOT testing as a condition of continued annual licensing on top of TfL's own annual inspection, at a site required to have ramp access for underside inspection.
That is a serious regime. It is not a loophole. It is the answer to the question TfL is now asking, built by TfL, staffed by TfL, and in force as of March 2026.
The consultation does not mention it. We checked the consultation page directly. It sets out the salvage categories, the affected numbers, the proposals and the safety rationale, and it contains no reference to the Vehicle Policy Team, no reference to the independent engineer's report, no reference to authorisation before licensing, and no reference to the V5C special notes referral route in the Inspection Manual.
A consultee cannot sensibly answer "how quickly should we remove these vehicles" without being told what is currently done about them and why it is said to be insufficient. That is the single most important omission in the document, and it would be straightforward for TfL to fix.
What a salvage marker actually records
The proposal treats the salvage marker as a proxy for risk. It is worth being precise about what the marker is, because it is not what most people assume.
It starts with an insurer's commercial decision
There are two stages, and only the first is economic. We want to state this accurately, because the loose version of the argument is wrong and TfL would rebut it in a line.
Stage one is whether the vehicle is written off at all. That is a cost decision, and it is the statutory trigger. The Road Vehicles (Registration and Licensing) Regulations 2002, Schedule 3A, paragraph 1(1), as substituted with effect from 19 February 2018 by SI 2018/52, bites where an insurer determines that the vehicle "has sustained damage such that the repair costs, or the total cost of repair and associated ancillary costs, exceed the pre-accident value of that vehicle". The Financial Ombudsman Service has recorded the working threshold in practice: "It's not unusual for insurers to decide a vehicle is uneconomical to repair once the repair costs reach around 60 to 70% of its pre-accident value" (decision DRN-4155706, 2023).
Stage two is which letter is applied, and that is a damage type test rather than a cost test. Category S is a repairable vehicle that has sustained damage to the structural frame or chassis. Category N is a repairable vehicle that has not.
So the accurate formulation, and it loses none of its force, is this: no vehicle ever acquires an S or N marker unless an insurer has first made a private commercial decision, on repair cost against pre-accident value, not to repair it. The marker records that commercial choice plus a private assessor's description of where the damage sat. It records nothing at all about how the vehicle was subsequently repaired, and nothing about its condition today.
The Department for Transport, which is the government department responsible for road safety policy, says so plainly in its consumer guidance published on 26 October 2015: "There is nothing wrong with buying a 'written off' vehicle that has been returned to a good condition. Indeed, often this represents good value for money." It reserves its safety warning for actual losses, categories A and B: "Vehicles that are deemed an 'actual loss' should never be repaired and returned to the road."
We agree with that distinction, and so, in its current Inspection Manual, does TfL.
The letters are not in any statute
Category A, B, S and N are not statutory categories. They are created by the Association of British Insurers Code of Practice for the Categorisation of Motorised Vehicle Salvage, version 12, document dated 28 May 2025. The current S and N split was introduced in October 2017, replacing the former categories C and D.
The ABI is candid about the Code's status. In its announcement of 28 May 2025 it states: "The Salvage Code of Practice is a voluntary code which was brought about by the ABI because there is no regulation relating to written-off vehicles." It adds: "We continue to call for the Salvage Code to be put in statutory footing."
The statutory framework knows only two phrases, "suitable for repair" and "structural damage", and Schedule 3A defines neither. It sets no criteria, no threshold, no qualification requirement for the assessor, no independent verification and no appeal. Under the ABI Code the category is determined by an Appropriately Qualified Person, a private assessor working within the insurer's own process. There is no statutory register of such assessors and no public body that validates the assessment.
Two things follow. First, if TfL prohibits a class of vehicle by reference to these letters, it is importing a private industry classification into a public licensing standard, and adopting whatever the ABI decides that classification means in future, without any further decision by TfL. Second, the completeness of the underlying data is guaranteed by a voluntary code rather than by any legal duty. The marker travels through MIAFTR, a private register operated by the Motor Insurers' Bureau, into commercial vehicle history providers.
There is no appeal
There is no statutory right of appeal against a categorisation. The Code's only mechanism is internal: "In the event of a dispute between the insurer/self-insured and other interested parties regarding categorisation, the matter should be escalated to an AQP who assumes responsibility for the final decision." That is escalation to another industry assessor inside the same private process.
The Financial Ombudsman Service is not an answer to this. Its scope is whether the insurer treated its own customer fairly under the policy, not whether the engineering categorisation was right. In decision DRN-4155706 a policyholder dented a car door, the insurer recorded it as Category N because repairs came to around 65 per cent of pre-accident value, and she produced an independent engineer's report saying the vehicle was clearly repairable and should not have been recorded as a total loss. The complaint was not upheld. The ombudsman reasoned that the insurer did not dispute the vehicle was repairable, it had chosen not to repair it, and the policy allowed it to pay a cash sum instead. An independent engineer saying the marker was wrong did not remove the marker.
And the ombudsman route is only open to the insurer's own eligible customer. A driver or an operator who later buys the vehicle was never that customer, and has no forum at all.
There is also no state process by which a properly repaired vehicle can ever demonstrate that fact. The Vehicle Identity Check scheme, the only official check in this area, closed on 26 October 2015, and in any event verified identity rather than repair quality. The Department for Transport's own guidance tells buyers to commission their own report from an independent expert.
So a private, unappealable, permanent marker, recording a commercial decision made by a company with no duty to the eventual owner, would become a permanent disqualification of the vehicle from licensed use in London, and for an owner driver whose car is the whole of their capital, that is the same thing in practice.
Category N leaves no mark on the V5C
This point matters for both limbs of the consultation.
For a Category S vehicle, the logbook is surrendered and DVLA issues a new one carrying the category. For a Category N vehicle, gov.uk states: "You can keep the log book if you want to keep a category N vehicle." The ABI Code's own flow chart records for Category N that the V5C is reissued with no literal comment added. That follows from the statute, because Schedule 3A paragraph 1(2) requires the insurer to destroy the registration document only where the vehicle is not suitable for repair or has sustained structural damage.
DVLA is still notified, because paragraph 1(1)(a) requires the insurer to report whether the vehicle sustained structural damage or not. But the document itself is silent.
That has a direct consequence for TfL. The referral route in the Inspection Manual is triggered by a reference in the special notes section on page 1 of the V5C. A Category N vehicle carries no such reference. If TfL intends any bar to extend to Category N, the V5C cannot detect it, and the consultation does not explain what would.
The evidence gap
TfL's justification is that damage "might look to be only cosmetic on the outside but there could be much more serious structural damage underneath", framed against the Vision Zero ambition.
We take Vision Zero seriously and we are not going to be flippant about it. But "could be" is a hypothesis, and this consultation asks respondents to accept it without any of the following:
- any defect rate for licensed salvage vehicles,
- any comparison of defect rates between salvage and non salvage licensed vehicles,
- any MOT or licensing inspection failure comparison,
- any collision data,
- any in service structural failure case, in London or anywhere else.
None of that appears anywhere in the consultation. We checked directly. There is no published finding that the existing Vehicle Policy Team process has failed, no count of how many of the 3,555 went through it, and no statement of how many were refused.
TfL holds the licensing and inspection data. It licenses every one of these vehicles, inspects them annually, and knows which ones are salvage, because that is how it arrived at the figure of 3,555. Where TfL does not hold collision data directly, it is able to obtain it.
We would put the question in the most constructive form available. Publish the comparison. If licensed salvage vehicles show a materially worse safety record than comparable licensed vehicles, the case for the firm proposal is made, and this objection falls away. If they do not, then the existing gateway is working and the honest conclusion is to strengthen it rather than to abolish it.
What other licensing authorities have done
TfL will be told that a salvage ban is standard practice. It is worth being accurate about that too.
Excluding Category A and B is close to universal, and rightly so, because those vehicles should never return to the road at all. Excluding Category S and N as well is a minority position among the authorities we examined.
Greater Manchester's Minimum Licensing Standards, adopted district by district, include a full bar. Bury Council adopted the standard on 24 November 2021. The transition is the interesting part: the original cut off was 1 April 2022, existing licence holders were then permitted to renew to 31 March 2023, and on 16 March 2023 members resolved to extend the implementation date for written off vehicles to 1 April 2026. Existing vehicles ended up with roughly four and a half years.
At its meeting on 25 June 2026 the City of Doncaster Council Licensing Committee agreed to bar all categories of insurance write off, including Category S and Category N, and, as reported by the Local Democracy Reporting Service, reduced the officers' recommended three year grace period to 18 months running from the date the new policy takes effect. At the time of writing the minutes of that meeting and the amended policy had not been published, and the council's published policy is still the previous version, so the 18 month figure rests on that reporting rather than on a council document.
Doncaster is the closest recent analogue, but it is not comparable to what TfL firmly proposes. Doncaster went further: all categories including N, and retrospective, which is precisely the question TfL has only asked about.
Two features of the Doncaster papers are worth putting in front of TfL. The officer recommendation, at Appendix B to the committee report of 25 June 2026, was three years: "A 'grace period' of 3 years from date of implementation, will be applied to existing licensed vehicles." Members reduced it against that advice.
And the stated reason for the ban was not vehicle failure data. We searched the committee report and appendix for collision, accident, defect and failure rate material and found none. The reason given was: "There is no standard level of inspection report to establish the suitability and safety of vehicles which have previously been written off", and that the authority "has seen a range of inspection reports produced, with varying level of details and, in most cases, no clear indication that the vehicle is safe and roadworthy."
That is a complaint about the inconsistency of inspection reports, not evidence that these vehicles fail in service. It is a complaint that London is better placed to answer, because the report is reviewed by TfL's own Vehicle Policy Team rather than simply accepted. It is not, however, a complaint London is immune from, which is why we ask below that TfL publish what the report must contain.
Elsewhere the picture is mixed. City of Wolverhampton Council's licensing policy, approved by its Regulatory Committee on 1 October 2025, expressly permits both categories: "The vehicle may be insurance category S (formerly Cat C) or category N (formerly Cat D), provided the vehicle has been repaired and an MOT test passed." Birmingham City Council's published Hackney Carriage and Private Hire Licensing Policy contains no provision on insurance write offs or salvage categories at all. North Yorkshire Council bars Category A, B and S but continues to licence Category N on an appropriate engineer's report. Bromsgrove District Council bars Category A, B, C and S, and in July 2024 amended its policy so that the bar applies only to vehicles written off after first licensing, which removed retrospection entirely.
The fair summary is this. What TfL firmly proposes, stopping new licences, is unusual but not unique. Of the authorities we examined, only Greater Manchester and Doncaster applied a bar to vehicles already on the road. Greater Manchester allowed roughly four and a half years. Doncaster's 18 months is the shortest transition we found anywhere, and it was a member amendment against professional officer advice.
Questions about lawfulness that TfL should answer
We are not asserting that this proposal is unlawful. We do not think that would be accurate, and a consultation response that overstates its case is worth less than one that does not. We have set aside several arguments that we do not think are correct in law, rather than repeat them.
In particular: TfL almost certainly does have the power to do this. Section 7(2)(c) of the Private Hire Vehicles (London) Act 1998 allows TfL to require "that any further requirements that may be prescribed are met", and section 32(1) confers the power to make those regulations on the licensing authority itself, which is TfL. It has used that route before, for the age limit, the emissions standards and the zero emission capable requirement in Schedule 1 to the Private Hire Vehicles (London PHV Licences) Regulations 2004. A vires argument is therefore not available, and we do not advance one.
Nor is a phase out applied at renewal unlawful in principle. In Welwyn Hatfield Borough Council v West and Central Hertfordshire Magistrates Court [2024] EWHC 3356 (Admin), Linden J proceeded on the footing that a vehicle age policy applied at renewal to already licensed vehicles was lawful, and held that the burden lies on the person seeking an exception. Nor are categorical rules unlawful merely because they admit no individual assessment: in In re Gallagher; R (P, G and W) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2019] UKSC 3 the Supreme Court adopted the Strasbourg principle, drawn from Animal Defenders International v United Kingdom (2013) 57 EHRR 21, that a state may "adopt general measures which apply to pre-defined situations regardless of the individual facts of each case even if this might result in individual hard cases". Lord Sumption held at paragraphs 50 and 51 that the court's task in such cases is to assess the proportionality of the categorisation rather than its impact on individual cases.
What follows are therefore questions, not accusations. We think each of them is one TfL should answer in the record of its decision.
1 What is the legal mechanism, and does it carry the existing exemption?
The consultation does not say whether the change would be made by amending the 2004 Regulations, by licensing policy, by the Conditions of Fitness, or otherwise. That matters to the respondent, because regulation 3(2) of the 2004 Regulations already provides that TfL "may exempt a vehicle from any of the requirements of this regulation and Schedule 1" where the applicant asks and TfL "is satisfied that, having regard to exceptional circumstances, it is reasonable to do so."
A salvage requirement added to Schedule 1 inherits that safety valve. A bare internal policy applied by officers does not. A consultee cannot respond intelligently on the effect on existing licences without knowing which route is intended. We ask TfL to state it.
2 Will there be a route to an exception?
The stated aim is to have "no salvage vehicles in the fleet". If that is implemented as an absolute bar with no mechanism for an owner to demonstrate that a specific vehicle is structurally sound, it engages the principle in British Oxygen Co Ltd v Board of Trade [1971] AC 610, that an authority operating a policy must remain willing to listen to anyone with something new to say.
We are not predicting that TfL would lose such a challenge. We are asking that any rule be drafted with an exception route supported by independent structural inspection, which is a concrete and lawful request that TfL is fully equipped to grant.
3 Existing vehicles: renewal, revocation and property
Because a London PHV licence lasts a maximum of one year under section 7(6), TfL does not need to revoke anything to clear the existing 3,555. It can simply decline the next annual grant. The operative mechanism is therefore the annual grant, not revocation under section 16(3).
Two points follow. First, section 16(3)(a) permits revocation where TfL "is no longer satisfied" that the vehicle is fit. Where a salvage history was disclosed, referred, assessed and accepted, and the vehicle's condition is unchanged, it is at least arguable that there is nothing on which TfL has ceased to be satisfied. We put that as arguable, because section 16(1) also confers a wide power to act for "any reasonable cause", and we found no authority establishing the point.
Second, we would ask TfL to address the property dimension honestly. We do not put weight on legitimate expectation: the modern law, in United Policyholders Group v Attorney General of Trinidad and Tobago [2016] UKPC 17, requires a clear, unambiguous and unqualified promise directed at an identified group, and the mere continuation of a policy is not that. But the vehicle itself is plainly a possession, and a phase out is a control of its use engaging Article 1 of the First Protocol, which requires a fair balance and a reasonable relationship of proportionality between the means employed and the aim pursued. We note for completeness that in Tre Traktorer Aktiebolag v Sweden the Court found A1P1 applicable but found no violation, and that states have a wide margin in this field. Engagement is not victory. But a fair balance is harder to demonstrate on a record that contains no data, and the Strasbourg court in that case treated the authority's own earlier positive decisions, including a renewal, as material.
4 Is this consultation adequate?
This is, in our view, the sharpest question, and it is a question about process rather than about outcome.
The Supreme Court in R (Moseley) v London Borough of Haringey [2014] UKSC 56 endorsed the Gunning criteria, including that "the proposer must give sufficient reasons for any proposal to permit of intelligent consideration and response". Lord Reed said at paragraph 39 that consultees should be provided "not only with information about the draft scheme, but also with an outline of the realistic alternatives, and an indication of the main reasons for the authority's adoption of the draft scheme". In Coughlan the Court of Appeal put the obligation as telling consultees "in clear terms what the proposal is and exactly why it is under positive consideration, telling them enough (which may be a good deal) to enable them to make an intelligent response."
Two features of this consultation bear on that. TfL states the aim as settled, no salvage vehicles in the fleet, and consults only on how quickly to get there. And it discloses no analysis, no data and no assessment of the existing control it already operates.
In R (Law Society) v Lord Chancellor [2018] EWHC 2094 (Admin) the Divisional Court held at paragraph 85 that consultees could not make an intelligent assessment of a proposed threshold without knowing the figures underpinning it, nor "give intelligent reasons for disagreeing with the proposed threshold if they were not told how it had been arrived at". The regulations were quashed. The same judgment is a direct answer to the "just over 3%" framing: at paragraph 75 the court noted that although only around 2 per cent of cases were affected, "in those cases which were affected, however, the effect was potentially severe."
We should record two honest qualifications. There appears to be no express statutory duty on TfL to consult before making regulations under section 32, which may make this a voluntary consultation, and whether the Gunning criteria apply in full to voluntary consultations was left undecided by the Court of Appeal in Secretary of State for Work and Pensions v Eveleigh [2023] EWCA Civ 810. And the duty of inquiry in Secretary of State for Education and Science v Tameside MBC [1977] AC 1014 is a demanding rationality test rather than a process test: as the Divisional Court warned in R (Plantagenet Alliance Ltd) v Secretary of State for Justice [2014] EWHC 1662 (QB), Tameside "should not be used to introduce a consultation process by the back door".
We therefore put it as a request rather than an allegation. Publish the evidence base, publish an account of the existing Vehicle Policy Team route and why it is said to be insufficient, and give consultees the chance to respond to that before the pace of any phase out is fixed.
5 Proportionality and less restrictive alternatives
Where a licensing measure has to be justified, the standard question is whether it is suitable to achieve the objective and whether the objective could be attained by a less onerous method. TfL argued exactly that framework successfully in R (Uber London Ltd) v Transport for London [2017] EWHC 435 (Admin) in defending the English language requirement. It is worth adding, because it is often omitted, that TfL also won on appeal on the telephone requirement in [2018] EWCA Civ 1213, where the Court of Appeal held that TfL "has a discretion about the appropriate level of consumer protection and how to go about achieving it" and that the judge had erred by substituting his own view. We cite that against ourselves.
The less onerous methods here are obvious and already exist: mandatory rather than discretionary independent engineer's reports for structural salvage, a mandatory underside inspection at licensing for any vehicle with a salvage history, a defined list of what the "specified information" in that report must contain, and a periodic history check. The consultation does not explain why any of those would fail.
We would also ask TfL to say what the rule is aimed at, because the framing matters. If the concern is genuinely hidden structural damage, a rule that also captures Category N raises a question about rational connection, since Category N by definition records damage that did not reach the structural frame or chassis. We note that the ABI Code itself warns that a Category N vehicle may still require the replacement of safety critical items, and that for electric vehicles the high voltage systems, including the high voltage battery, may be compromised. If that is the concern, it is an argument for inspecting those items, not for a documentary bar. In Gallagher the Supreme Court upheld the disclosure schemes in general, but held the multiple conviction rule disproportionate because it applied irrespective of the nature of the offences, their similarity, the number of occasions or the intervals between them. At paragraph 63: "As framed, therefore, the rule is incapable of indicating a propensity." That is the shape of the question we ask TfL to answer about Category N.
6 The public sector equality duty
TfL is listed in Schedule 19 to the Equality Act 2010 and in Schedule 2 to the Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties and Public Authorities) Regulations 2017, so section 149 applies across its functions and the publication duties apply in full, including information relating to "other persons affected by its policies and practices".
We are asking about process, not alleging discrimination. Those are legally distinct, as the Court of Appeal made clear in R (Bridges) v Chief Constable of South Wales Police [2020] EWCA Civ 1058, where the duty was described as one of process and not outcome. The same judgment holds at paragraph 181 that section 149 "requires the taking of reasonable steps to make enquiries about what may not yet be known to a public authority about the potential impact of a proposed decision or policy on people with the relevant characteristics", and at paragraph 182 that the purpose of the positive duty is to ensure an authority "does not inadvertently overlook information which it should take into account". No equality impact assessment is legally mandated, as the Court of Appeal confirmed in R (Sheakh) v London Borough of Lambeth Council [2022] EWCA Civ 457 at paragraph 10, but the substance of the regard must be there.
The context is not speculative. In Independent Workers Union of Great Britain v The Mayor of London [2020] EWCA Civ 1046 it was common ground, at paragraph 3, that 94 per cent of licensed minicab drivers in London are from black and minority ethnic backgrounds, with 71 per cent living in the most deprived areas of London. The challenge in that case failed, the measure being held justified, and we cite it only for the demographic finding, which was common ground between the parties. TfL's own Taxi and private hire action plan 2025 states at page 12 that "the current licensed taxi and private hire driver population does not reflect the diversity of the capital, when compared to 2021 Census data."
A measure that removes the lower cost end of the vehicle market falls hardest on the lowest earning drivers, many of whom are still working towards their PCO licence or paying for a car week by week. We ask TfL to state, before deciding, what enquiries it has made into who owns the 3,555 vehicles, what they are worth, and what a phase out would cost those owners.
7 A private standard doing public work
Pulling the earlier points together into one question: is it appropriate for a public licensing standard to turn on a classification created by a voluntary industry code, applied by a private assessor, recorded on a private register, against which there is no appeal by anyone other than the insurer's own customer, and which in the case of Category N does not appear on the V5C at all?
We think TfL should answer that in terms, whichever way it decides.
Our answer to TfL's open question
TfL has asked how quickly it should aim to have no salvage vehicles in the fleet. Here is our answer, in full, and we would ask that it be treated as our formal response to that question.
First, do not apply any bar retrospectively at all, unless and until the data supports it. We ask TfL not to proceed with the firm proposal on the present evidence. If it does proceed, the firm proposal on its own achieves the stated aim within the natural life of the affected vehicles, and no retrospective element is needed. TfL already has express power to do this cleanly: section 32(2) of the 1998 Act allows regulations to "make different provision for different cases", to "provide for exemptions from any provision of the regulations", and to "contain incidental, consequential, transitional and supplemental provision". A grandfathering provision is a drafting matter, not a legal obstacle. Bromsgrove took precisely this route in July 2024.
Second, if TfL is not prepared to grandfather, publish the evidence first and then set the period. Publish the defect and failure comparison between salvage and non salvage licensed vehicles, publish how many of the 3,555 went through the Vehicle Policy Team route, and publish how many were refused. Consult on the transition period after that material is in front of respondents, not before.
Third, if a transition is imposed, it should be a minimum of three years from implementation. Three years was what professional licensing officers recommended in Doncaster on the basis of a full twelve week consultation. Greater Manchester, having tried a shorter period twice, ended up at roughly four and a half years. Eighteen months is the outlier, it was set against officer advice, and it should not be the model for a fleet the size of London's.
Fourth, whatever is decided, build in an exception route. An owner should be able to apply for an exemption on the basis of an independent structural inspection by an appropriately qualified engineer, assessed by the Vehicle Policy Team. Regulation 3(2) already provides the machinery. Using it costs TfL nothing and removes the sharpest legal objection to the scheme.
Fifth, publish what "specified information" means. The Inspection Manual requires an engineer's report, where one is required, to contain specified information, and does not say anywhere what that information is. Publishing a defined schedule would answer the exact complaint that drove the Doncaster decision, that inspection reports are inconsistent and often give no clear indication that the vehicle is safe, and it would do so without removing a single vehicle from the road.
Sixth, if TfL proceeds, be explicit about Category N. Say whether it is in scope, and if it is, explain how a rule keyed to the V5C is expected to detect a category that leaves no mark on the V5C.
The other proposal in the same consultation
The same consultation contains a second, quieter change: restricting proof of ownership to the full V5C logbook only, and no longer accepting V62 applications, online transfer confirmations or V5C/2 green slips.
We understand the impulse, and we do not oppose tightening ownership evidence in principle. Ownership fraud is real and a licensing authority is entitled to want certainty.
But the current practice is not lax, and the Inspection Manual shows it. At section 1.1 it already sets out structured alternatives: where the change of ownership slip is presented without a copy of the V5, other documents are used to confirm the identity of the vehicle; a new keeper supplement must identify the new keeper, and where the new style supplement does not, an online DVLA transfer confirmation is required stating new keeper name, address and vehicle details; and where the vehicle was purchased from a dealership, a gov.uk document supplied by the dealership is acceptable.
The practical difficulty is timing. DVLA does not issue a V5C the moment a vehicle changes hands, and a driver waiting for the logbook is a driver not working. If TfL restricts acceptance to the full V5C alone, we would ask it to publish the expected effect on time to licence, and to consider a defined interim route with a hard backstop rather than a flat prohibition.
There is one connection between the two proposals that should not be missed. A V5C only rule is being proposed as part of a package aimed at salvage vehicles, and the V5C does not record Category N at all. Tightening the document does not close that gap.
How to respond, before 13 September 2026
The consultation closes on Sunday 13 September 2026, and implementation is proposed for autumn 2026, subject to the outcome. If you drive or own a licensed vehicle in London, this is the point at which your view counts. After the decision is taken, it does not.
Respond at haveyoursay.tfl.gov.uk/salvage-vehicles. The full online survey takes about ten minutes. There is also a quick response option if that is all you have time for, and TfL accepts responses by telephone on 020 3054 6037, by email, and by post to FREEPOST TFL HAVE YOUR SAY.
A few suggestions on making a response that will be read. Say whether you own or drive a salvage vehicle, and say what would happen to you if the licence were not renewed. Say whether your vehicle went through the Vehicle Policy Team process, and what you were asked to provide. If you have an engineer's report, say so. Specific, first hand accounts from the people actually affected carry more weight with a regulator than volume, and they are the thing TfL genuinely cannot get anywhere else.
Our own position, for the record and stated once. Blackties does not run salvage vehicles. We hold our cars to the highest standard. A ban would benefit us and we are asking TfL not to impose it on this evidence, or on this timetable. Our position, and the rest of our writing for London drivers, is at blackties.co.uk/blog.
If TfL publishes figures that show we are wrong, we will say so here.
Salvage history is only one of the ways a vehicle gets refused. The nine most common rejection reasons covers the rest, and what TfL actually checks at the licensing inspection explains where a salvage marker gets spotted.