Can I also thank David Rowlands for his observations and recommendations in his constructive contribution today?

Under the current legislation, as I've already outlined, we have 22 local authorities operating different licensing policies across Wales, and that includes, as I've outlined, in terms of the maximum age of the licensed vehicle, the licence duration, the licence insurance checks, and also the driving licence checks. Having a consistent national approach, I think, makes perfect sense both for the industry and for passengers, and many of the points that David Rowlands has raised today relate not just to the new legislation proposals, but also to the recommendations that came from our work with the Welsh Local Government Association, and the recommendations are aiming to improve standards and consistency of licensing policies without incurring unreasonable costs to the taxi industry or local authorities.

So, the recommendations include—and I think David Rowlands would welcome this—standard driver and operator conditions; enforcement protocols for cross-border authorisations; crucially, driver safeguarding training and a driver code of conduct; and also standardised driver application criteria. So, as adoption of the recommendations will achieve compliance with many of the Department for Transport standards, the Welsh Government is going to be monitoring local authority compliance to both documents, and this approach has been agreed, obviously, by the Secretary of State for Transport.

But then going on to the longer term, the taxi Bill is currently projected to be introduced in year 2 of the next Senedd and, as I've said, work has already begun on drafting policy proposals that build on the responses to the 'Improving public transport' White Paper. More detail is being developed around national standards, which David Rowlands pointed to as being absolutely vital, a national register and improved enforcement, which is proposed under the White Paper, and, in addition, new proposals include introducing a simplified one-tier licensing system to remove that distinction that I talked of earlier, and to create the single licensing authority and to allow taxis to operate across Wales.

I've just got to reinforce the point that I made earlier that new legislation is absolutely vital to effectively address the issues raised by the industry and regulators. Effective change, I'm afraid, cannot occur using the existing legislation or adopting voluntary measures.