A THIRTY-strong army of taxi drivers descended on Craven District Council in a last ditch attempt to get members to change their minds about bringing in an additional driving test.

But councillors could not be persuaded and instead voted to bring in an extra Driving Standards Agency test, which all Craven taxi drivers will have to take by the end of March next year.

Drivers had already submitted two petitions, held a protest outside Skipton Town Hall and organised a "go slow" on Skipton High Street to demonstrate their opposition.

The idea for the tests was first mooted by Craven coroner Geoff Fell at an inquest into the deaths of taxi driver Arfam Ullah Khan and his passenger Stephen McGeoch in a road accident near Gargrave last year.

Chairman of the council's licensing committee Coun Robert Heseltine said that another 50 authorities already had the DSA tests in place.

He said: "This authority is in the business of driving up standards and has never been satisfied with second best."

Coun Heseltine added that the measures were not a "knee jerk" reaction to the fatal accident and stressed that the safety of the travelling public was a priority.

But vice chairman of the licensing committee Coun Polly English was vehemently opposed to the new tests and instead she proposed a "mystery shopper" style monitoring system.

She said that the DSA tests were merely a repeat of the standard driving test and branded it a "draconian measure."