Licence is lost at second inquiry
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Newton Stewart-based haulier William Jolly has had his licence revoked and has been disqualified from holding an 0-licence for three years after his second disciplinary inquiry in less than 12 months.
Jolly, who traded as BJ Transport, had been called before Scottish Traffic Commissioner Michael Betts at a Dumfries disciplinary inquiry.
In June 2000 Jolly appeared at a public inquiry as a result of a conviction. At that time the TC suspended one vehicle for two weeks and required new calibration certificates for all the vehicles—he emphasised that Jolly's repute was "on a knife edge".
The TC heard that in August 2000 one of Jolly's vehicles, driven by his son, was involved in a serious accident in which it overturned on the MO in Lancashire. Police investigations showed that the speed limiter had not been working and that the vehicle had been travelling at 68.75mph just before the accident. Speed limits had been considerably exceeded for the whole journey.
There had been nothing wrong with the speed limiter and the fuse was intact but a wire was found in the cab similar to ones used to short-circuit tachographs or speed limiters. The tachograph charts being used were of the wrong type and six weeks' charts were found in the cab.
Over the next four months another three of Jolly's vehicles were found to have wrongly calibrated speed limiters or limiters which had been disabled.
For Jolly, Roger Colledge said that he knew nothing about the tampering with the speed limiters and tachographs; he suggested that it must have been done by drivers for their own reasons. Since the previous public inquiry all the speed limiters had been recalibratod and the drivers had been given warning letters which stated they would be dismissed if they tampered with speed limiters or tachographs.
The TC commented that for such failings to have been discovered so soon after the previous public inquiry, at which he had warned Jolly that his repute was tarnished, was almost unbelievable.
"I believe that you knew far more, certainly about the switch found in your own vehicle, than you now admit," he told Jolly. "I equally believe that you had allowed a culture to develop whereby one way or another speeding in your firm was the norm. You have demonstrated twice now a total disregard for mad safety and fair trading—the fundamentals of operator licensing—and you must be taken out of the industry."