Haulier's widow loses appeal
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A 70-year-old widow who took over her husband's haulage business when he died in 1992, has lost her appeal against Scottish Traffic Commissioner Michael Betts' refusal to grant her a fresh licence.
The licence previously held by Georgina Allan, trading as Charles Allan Haulage, of Fallin, had terminated automatically when the annual fee was not paid by the due date. She applied for a new licence for two vehicles and four trailers.
The Transport Tribunal said that Mrs Allan's son had acted as her nominated transport manager until September 1998. The Traffic Area Office then wrote to Mrs Allan about the appointment of a new transport manager, but the letters were returned by the Post Office. A fee request sent in January 1999 was also returned.
A new transport manager, Kevin Walshe, was not appointed until she applied for a licence in March 1999. Despite the termination of her licence Mrs Allan had continued to operate her vehicles. One had been used for two months after the expiry of its annual test certificate; a driver had taken insufficient weekly rest; and there were deficiencies in the maintenance system.
Refusing the application, the TC had said it was obvious that Mrs Allan's knowledge of the licensing requirements was very thin. There was no significant transport manager involvement and repeated failings in the maintenance arrangements showed they might have been inadequate for a long time. When things began to go wrong they got worse and worse, largely because Mrs Allan seemed to receive no proper advice. He was critical of both her son and of Walshe for failing to advise her properly.
Before the Tribunal, Mrs Allan argued that the TC had given too much weight to the lack of documentation. She said her problems had arisen because she had moved house and there had been a change of transport manager. She was going to overcome her lack of knowledge by studying for her own CPC.
Dismissing the appeal, the Tribunal said it was for the TC to assess the extent to which a business was properly controlled. Mrs Allan had to satisfy him that she was ''professionally competent", and this could be done by having a transport manager who was himself "professionally competent". "Transport manager" meant someone who, either alone or jointly, had continuous and effective responsibility for the management of the transport operations. The words "continuous and effective" required the achievement of a result, a breach of which was self-evident from the poor performance.