Trucks suspended for maintenance
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West Midland Traffic Commissioner David Dixon told Hartlebury.
Worcester-based Richard Francis that he was "a lucky man in not having your licence revoked todaywhen he suspended two of Francis' four vehicles for a month at a Birmingham disciplinary inquiry.
given severe warnings in regard to his maintenance standards.
Vehicle examiner John West said since then nine prohibition notices and three variation notices had been issued to Francis's vehicles. listing 31 defects. West agreed that there had been no prohibitions since September and that none of the recent prohibitions had been for a significant maintenance failure: the concern was the frequency rather than the content of the prohibitions.
He agreed that there had been some improvement in maintenance standards over the past five years.
For Francis, Paul Carless said he had been hauling trailers for a Newport company, and there had been problems with those trailers.
Francis said he now owned his own trailers and had stopped pulling other people's. A full-time fitter had been engaged in August, and the prohibitions seemed to have stopped since he got to grips with the situation.
He agreed he had been operating for two months with out telling the Matti:. Area that his nominated transport manager had disappeared To Canada with her boyfriend.
Financial evidence was then heard in private at Francis' request.
Asking the TC to give Francis a final chance, Carless commented: "if he comes to a fourth inquiry not even the Angel Gabriel will be able to help. If he can't get it right now he had better go and do something else."
The TC pointed out that there were ample grounds for revoking the licence but he had decided to give Francis a Final chance. He had done just about enough, although belatedly, to avoid revocation.
He gave Francis three weeks to get a qualified transport manager in place and four weeks in which to produce his 1999 accounts.
The TC concluded that there should be a further unannounced maintenance investigation, and if that was unsatisfactory or there were any more prohibitions, he could not think there would be any alternative but to revoke the licence.