No notice taken of warning
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A Liverpool firm caught using a vehicle without licence authority, despite a previous warning at a public inquiry in October 1998, has had its licence revoked.
George and James Draper, trading as Southend Timber Demolition, of Toxteth, appeared before North
Western Deputy Traffic Commis
sioner Brian Homer at a Leeds disciplinary inquiry They held a licence for two vehicles.
Vehicle examiner David Collings said that in April a tipper stopped in a roadside check was given an immediate prohibition listing eight defects and endorsed as showing a significant maintenance failure.
The defects were not new and they were clearly visible. The vehicle was not displaying an 0-licence disc and was not specified on the firm's licence, the authorisation on which had been fully taken up.
One of the reasons the firm had appeared at the previous public inquiry was for operating more vehicles than it was licensed for. The correct procedure for adding an extra vehicle to the licence had been explained to George Draper; he was told that when an application was received interim authority would be granted.
Draper had elected to ignore that advice and was still using the same vehicle without the authority of an 0-licence.
Since the licence was granted in June 1997, the firm's vehicles had attracted one delayed and five immediate prohibitions, three of them for significant maintenance failures, Ceilings reported. Despite a warning about maintenance at the previous public inquiry, advice had not been heeded and vehicles were being oper
ated that were a potential danger to their dryers and other road users.
Vehicle examiner Allen Barnes said that in June he had examined two vehicles, issuing one delayed prohibition and one immediate prohibition. The parking " arrangements were inadequate for the three vehicles in daily use—there was only room for two vehicles at any one time.
George Draper said that the third vehicle was now off the mad and was to be disposed of. He had not applied to put it on the licence as work had gone slack and it had been stood in the yard. He accepted that he should not have used it in April but a job had come in for it and he took it out without thinking to have it inspected first.
The Deputy IC said that there had been a flagrant disregard of the advice given by the IC on the previous occasion. The result was disastrous. An unauthorised vehicle had been put on the road in a highly dangerous state, which was something he was not prepared to tolerate.