Uber Britannia Limited v Sefton Metropolitan Borough Council & Ors

Under Part II of the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1976, a licensed private-hire vehicle operator who accepts a passenger’s booking must contract with the passenger as principal to provide the booked journey. This remains so whether the operator provides the vehicle itself or arranges for another operator to do so. The requirement follows from the statutory concepts of operating, accepting bookings, the deemed contract provision and the statutory record-keeping and subcontracting scheme. The public-protection purpose of the legislation supports that construction. Insurance, licensing conditions and economic or taxation consequences do not replace the operator’s direct contractual responsibility.

Uber Britannia Limited brought a Part 8 claim under section 19 of the Senior Courts Act 1981 and CPR 40.20 for a declaration concerning the proper construction of Part II of the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1976. The claim concerned private-hire vehicle operators outside London.

Uber argued that an operator accepting a booking must enter a contractual obligation with the passenger as principal to provide the journey. Bolt Services UK Limited and the App Drivers and Couriers Union supported that position. Veezu Holdings Limited and D.E.L.T.A Merseyside Limited opposed it, relying on traditional agency and driver-contracting models. Sefton Metropolitan Borough Council remained neutral. The central issue was whether the statutory scheme required the accepting operator to contract directly with the passenger as principal.

1. Declaration granted. The court answered yes: a licensed operator accepting a private-hire booking must enter as principal into a contractual obligation with the passenger to provide the booked journey.
2. The statutory scheme treats the operator and passenger as the primary regulated relationship. A private-hire vehicle is defined as a vehicle provided for hire with the services of a driver. The concept of operating includes making provision for inviting or accepting bookings, and accepting a booking necessarily connotes a contract with the passenger.
3. Section 56(1) of the Local Government (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1976 deems every hire contract to be made with the operator who accepted the booking, whether or not that operator provides the vehicle. The provision preserves the accepting operator’s principal responsibility where the booking is subcontracted. Sections 55A and 55B reinforce that construction by regulating subcontracting and allocating criminal liability between the first and second operators.
4. The provisions on record-keeping and subcontracting show that the operator remains central to regulatory control even when another operator or driver provides the vehicle. The operator’s direct responsibility promotes public safety by creating effective incentives to select, manage and supervise suitable drivers and vehicles.
5. The Private Hire Vehicles (London) Act 1998 provides a meaningful comparator. Its provisions and the reasoning in Uber London Limited v Transport for London support the same construction of the 1976 Act. The different wording of the two Acts does not produce a different result.
6. The public-protection purpose of the legislation was a strong interpretive aid. Licensing, insurance and licence conditions were not equivalent substitutes for precautionary contractual responsibility. Taxation, fare, competition and market consequences were irrelevant to the statutory construction exercise.

The application succeeded and the declaration was made.