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Flytipper plans to appeal
Page 33
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The directors of a firm convicted of flytipping have been banned from
holding 0-licences for five years, but the trucks are still rolling.
A COMPANY WHOSE licence was revoked because of numerous fly-tipping convictions has been allowed to keep operating pending an appeal to the Transport Tribunal.
Eastern Traffic Commissioner Geoffrey Simms had held that Harlow-based Muck It had lost its repute, as had transport manager John Huke. In addition to revoking the licence, he disqualified the company and its directors. Hazel and Hayley Merritt, from holding or obtaining an 0-licence in any Traffic Area for a period of five years.
Paul Lockyer, an Environment Agency enforcement officer, gave evidence about incidents of fly tipping involving vehicles operated by various companies that Huke was associated with, namely Abbey Excavations, Bradshaw Tipper Hire, County Services, J&H Skip Hire and Muck It.
Huke maintained that he had sold Abbey Excavations and Bradshaw Tipper Hire to a Gary Sharp of Gravesend before the offences were committed. He claimed that Muck It had sold the vehicle involved in fly tipping to County Services in April 2003.
His father and brother had been directors of that company until they resigned in March 2003,and he had loaned his brother the funds to establish County Services. That enterprise had not been successful and his brother currently undertook administrative duties for Muck h, while his father drove for the firm.
Making the revocation and disqualification orders, the TC said he was entitled to "pierce the veil of incorporation" because, without human assistance the businesses could not function. Huke had failed to produce statutory documents to the Environment Agency on the grounds that he was unable to as he had sold the businesses concerned.
Vehicles moved fluently The TC said he believed it was Huke who had controlled Abbey, J&H Skip Hire, Bradshaw, County and Muck It. That belief was amply supported by the ease and fluency with which vehicles had moved between the various licences. He felt that those administrative gymnastics were expressly for the purpose of keeping Huke one step ahead of the enforcement agencies. In that purpose, he had been spectacularly successful. The licences held by Abbey. Bradshaw and County no longer existed; the licences had served their purposes and were left to expire.
The TC concluded that this was a particularly bad case, and that the directors of Muck It had stood aside while John Huke manipulated the company, its vehicles and its 0-licence to his own advantage.
It is common for a stay of revocation to he allowed pending an appeal, except in cases where there are serious issues of road safety •