Director left in dark has ban cut by half
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The Transport Tribunal has cut the disqualification time from three years to 18 months for Michael Byrne, a director of M&L Courier Services, of Shoreditch, London.
The ban from holding or obtaining an 0-licence was originally imposed by South Eastern & Metropolitan Traffic Commissioner Brigadier Michael Turner after Byrne's company was called to public inquiry in January 1998 to deal with a number of matters raised by the Metropolitan Police. Byrne did not attend the inquiry and he subsequently maintained that transport manager Michael Cassidy had kept the directors in ignorance of the fact that a public inquiry was due to take place. The first they knew of it was when they received the letter stating that the company's licence had been revoked.
Byrne appealed against the disqualification order and the tribunal directed that the matter be reconsidered by the IC (CM14-20 January). However, after a further hearing the TC confirmed his decision to ban Byrne for three years. He said the directors had shown a reckless disregard for their duties in taking no steps to check the efficiency of the company's transport manager. Byrne again appealed against the disqualification.
The tribunal said it accepted that directors of a company holding an 0-licence were required to take reasonable stops to ensure that the transport manager was doing his job.
But directors must allow the transport manager to do his job and must not interfere with his management of the transport operations.
Byrne was not ignorant of transport matters generally and the tribunal agreed that disqualification was appropriate.
However, it considered three years to be too long a ban as Byrne had not been a party to Ca.ssidy's wrongdoing.