Q I am being prosecuted for an overloading offence. When I
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was stopped by the police I was a short distance from a weighbridge to which I was taking the vehicle for weighing. Could you quote the relevant law which includes a defence against prosecution in these circumstances?
A Part II of die Road Traffic Act 1972 governs the permitted weights of vehicles and the weighing of vehicles. Section 40 (1) (d) deals specifically with this aspect. Subsection (5) states that a failure to comply with regulations made under this Section constitutes an offence. The maximum penalty for such an offence has been adjusted to £400 by Schedule 5 of the Road Traffic Act 1974, However, Section 40 (6) (a) of the 1972 Act says that in any proceedings for an offence under subsection (5) it shall be a defence to prove that at the time when the vehicle was being used on the road it was proceeding to a weighbridge, which was the nearest available to the place where the vehicle was loaded, for the purpose of being weighed.
Note that it has to be proved that the vehicle was on its way to be weighed at the nearest weighbridge ; it is not sufficient just to say so. For. instance, has the driver been given any written instruction to go to the nearest weighbridge ?Alternatively, have, you,in Your possession, a number of weigh tickets to illustrate that it is your usual practice to weigh the vehicle when it has been loaded ?
Such evidence would clinch the matter beyond any possible doubt.