Here is a legal dilema,a fire engine was set up with a dance floor at the back of a limo type fire engine,the tv programme did not show how many seats were in the cab,but the owner got 2 years prison for no O licence,and the law about having more than 8 people seated for the coach/bus regs was flouted.
They had to prove the owner was operating under hire and reward,and set him up with undercover council ladies pretending to be on a hen party,and wait until the fire engine was on the public road to nab him,they said the gaps in the safety rails were too big,and boozed up party go-ers could fall in the road.
Was he in the right or in the wrong,or was this nit picking interference from someone trying to earn a living.
Where was this Toby?
On this mornings bbc ones new docu called Fake Britain,do you have access to see it again on line,it is on mon to fri at 09.15.
I never knew if you separate two materials,it is legal,you only break the law when the two go together,as in the importing of fake washing powder,and fake packaging from China on containers,the crooks made so much out of counterfeit powder,they bought a £100,000 tobacco packing machine,and were filmed by HMR&C,the gang got jail.
Forgot to add,the undercover ladies were all standing on the dance floor,and there were 11 of them,nobody was sat inside the cab,what is the law for 8 seats,and would he have needed a licence for what catergory of vehicle?
not 100 % sure but was,nt there a big fuss made a few years ago regarding all these limos and converted vehicles to party bus type vehicles.
afaik anything with 8 seats or more for hire or reward should mean you need a psv/pcv licence and the vehicle has regular inspections.
and i think a lot of the older yank limos needed to pass a certificate of conformity test or something like that.
as i said not 100% on this but i would explain the big price drop in these type of vehicles.
i expect he was done under taxi law up to 8 seats would require a private hire licence. the vehicle would have to pass a council private hire test which is carried out by a local m.o.t station.(i use to do them)
some councils require vehicles not to be older than 5 yrs as in my area, when they initalally first become a taxi. then once they get to 10 yrs they have to be tested twice a yr. but each council has different rules and bye laws 
oh forgot as well the driver would have to pass a crb check to get his personal taxi/private hire licence as well
Its Simple to understand
The council hired his vehicle and he charged them for his service which makes it Hire or reward therefore an O Licence is required, had it simply been a limousine carrying 5 passengers (Fire Engines only have 6 seats) he would of needed it registered as a private hire taxi, the laws were changed about 3 years ago because of the increase in the amount of stretched limo’s appearing on UK Roads. They also brought other vehicles into the range of licensing at the same time to close loop holes in the law.
If the Equipment wasn’t registered as a private hire taxi then he was caught bang to rights for flouting the law.