No pub stops allowed
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• North Eastern Traffic Commissioner Frederick Whalley has refused to remove conditions relating to the operation of football excursions placed on the licence held by Kevin Lambert, trading as Key Lambert's Coaches of Rotherham, following police complaints.
Whalley said commissioners had agreed to impose such conditions where operators failed to comply with a voluntary code drawn up by the chief constables' sub-committee on hooliganism at sporting events. The conditions of the code were that coaches should not arrive earlier than one hour before the kick off; should not stop within 161= of the destination; should not stop where there was intoxicating liquor, and should leave the ground within one hour of the final whistle.
In October Derbyshire police reported that a Lambert coach was seen to divert from the laid down route on its way to Derby, stopping in Ripley at 12.15prn, and passengers entering public houses. The driver had said that he was aware of police instructions to travel via the M1 Motorway and not enter Ripley. Lambert's tour manager Robin Critchlow said that the two coaches carrying the party would have arrived in Derby too early to be met by the police. They had pulled up in the market square to enable supporters to have a toilet stop and a meal.
He agreed that, the coaches had left Sheffield at about 10.15am, that the normal travelling time between Sheffield and Derby was two to 21/2 hours and that the match kicked off at 3pm.
Whalley pointed out that in a letter Lambert had stated that the coach was hired to Deltaway, and that he did not know where it was going when it left the depot.
Refusing to remove the conditions, Whalley said the whole purpose of the code was to prevent people from drinking on the way to sports fixtures. He found it unsatisfactory that the coach had been loaned to another operator when Lamberts Coaches had no idea what it was to be used for, and remarked that to have conditions on the licence was no penalty if the company intended to comply with the voluntary code anyway.