2022/25085 - Attacks on Taxi or Private Hire Drivers
REQUEST
I would be grateful if you could please provide the following:
- The total number of attacks and assaults on taxi and private hire drivers that have taken place each year from 2018 to 2021 inclusive
- Of these attacks, how many were ABH or Common Assault?
- The contents of the crime report in each instance (redacted)
- The total number of these where the crime report made reference to the victim working for Uber, Lyft, FreeNow, Bolt, Addison Lee, Kapten, Ola
- Of these attacks, how many have resulted in a prosecution?
RESPONSE
- The total number of attacks and assaults on taxi and private hire drivers that have taken place each year from 2018 to 2021 inclusive.
|
Year |
Total |
|
2018 |
89 |
|
2019 |
110 |
|
2020 |
79 |
|
2021 |
82 |
|
Grand Total |
360 |
2. Of these attacks, how many were ABH or Common Assault?
The table below breaks down the offences in question by offence title.
|
Offence Title |
Total |
|
Abduction of Child by Other Persons |
1 |
|
Administer Poison with Intent to Injure or Annoy |
1 |
|
Arrange or Facilitate Travel of another Person with a view to Exploitation |
2 |
|
Assault Occasioning Actual Bodily Harm. (Offences Against the Person Act 1861 Sec 47) |
89 |
|
Causing Danger to Road-Users |
10 |
|
Common Assault and Battery (Criminal Justice Act 1988 Sec 39.) |
159 |
|
Cruelty to and Neglect of Children. |
5 |
|
Engage in Controlling/Coercive Behaviour in an Intimate / Family Relationship. |
4 |
|
False Imprisonment |
2 |
|
Grievous Bodily Harm with Intent |
11 |
|
Malicious Wounding S.20 – No Intent |
2 |
|
Protection from Harassment Act Sec 2. (S.2 Protection from Harassment Act 1997) |
19 |
|
Pursue Course of Conduct which amounts to Stalking. Protection from Harassment Act 1997 (Protection of Freedom Act 2012) |
5 |
|
Racially or Religiously Aggravated Assault or Assault Occasioning Actual Bodily Harm |
3 |
|
Racially or Religiously Aggravated Common Assault or Beating S29(1)(C) and (3) Crime & Disorder Act 1998 |
11 |
|
Sending Letter etc. with Intent to cause Distress or Anxiety Malicious Communications Act 1988 Sec 1AS amended by Criminal Justice and Courts Act 2015 Sec 32 CJS Code: MT88001-MT88004 |
33 |
|
Stalking Involving Serious Alarm / Distress. Protection from Harassment Act 1997 (Protection of Freedom Act 2012) |
1 |
|
Threats to Kill |
2 |
|
Grand Total |
360 |
- The contents of the crime report in each instance (redacted)
To provide this information, each record would need to be redacted. It would take about 5 to look through each full record and to redact information, and to provide this information would take 30 hours (360 records x 5 minutes per record = 1,800 minutes = 30 hours). As this is over the 18-hour limit, this part of the FOI is therefore exempt under Section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
Section 12 – Excess Cost
The exemption applicable to the information you have requested for this question can be found at Section 12(1) of the Act and this refusal notice is issued under Section 17.
Section 12(1) “does not oblige a public authority to comply with a request for information if the authority estimates that the cost of complying with the request would exceed the appropriate limit.”
In the case of a police force, the appropriate limit is set at £450, which is calculated at £25 per hour (i.e. 18 hours). Gwent Police would have to conduct a manual search to find and extract the information for this question. This would take more than 18 hours of staff time therefore we are unable to answer this question and the exemption is engaged.
- The total number of these where the crime report made reference to the victim working for Uber, Lyft, FreeNow, Bolt, Addison Lee, Kapten, Ola.
A manual trawl would have to be completed as there is no filter to identify the type of employment a victim has. There are 1312 such offences recorded in January 2018 alone. It would take 2 minutes to look through each record. This would take over 43 hours to complete (1312 records x 2 minutes per record = 2624 minutes = 43+ hours) which is over the 18 hours and would therefore be exempt under section 12 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 as shown in question 3 above.
Section 12 – Excess Cost
The exemption applicable to the information you have requested for this question can be found at Section 12(1) of the Act and this refusal notice is issued under Section 17.
Section 12(1) “does not oblige a public authority to comply with a request for information if the authority estimates that the cost of complying with the request would exceed the appropriate limit.”
In the case of a police force, the appropriate limit is set at £450, which is calculated at £25 per hour (i.e., 18 hours). Gwent Police would have to conduct a manual search to find and extract the information for this question. This would take more than 18 hours of staff time therefore we are unable to answer this question and the exemption is engaged.
- Of these attacks, how many have resulted in a prosecution?
For this information you would need to contact the courts. Prosecution data can be obtained from them directly.