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Driver wound on clock in bid to attend party

18th November 1999
Page 19
Page 19, 18th November 1999 — Driver wound on clock in bid to attend party
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Mark Doherty, of Petts Wood, Kent, has been ordered to pay fines and costs of £720 for a series of tachograph offences.

When he appeared before South Ribble magistrates Doherty pleaded guilty to making a false tachograph record; failing to retain a tachograph chart for 12 months; failing to enter the closing mileage on the centre field; and withdrawing a tachograph chart before the end of the working day.

Prosecuting for the Vehicle Inspectorate, John Heaton said the offences were discovered when Doherty's artic was stopped in a check on the M6 on 27 January.

He had created a false chart by winding on the clock in an unsuccessful attempt to conceal the fact he had failed to take the required daily rest. The second offence related to the chart for the previous day, which Doherty had admitted destroying. The chart for 5 January had been removed when the vehicle was travelling at speed; Doherty had continued driving without a chart in the tachograph. Heaton reminded the court that the regulations were designed to avoid the danger of a tired driver being behind the wheel of an HGV. If accurate records were not kept it was impossible to check how many hours of driving had been done or how much rest had been taker.

Doherty said he had been having problems with his tachograph on 5 January.

On 27 January he had wound on the clock so that he could get home for his daughter's birthday party. He had had problems with the job that day and had been sat on some services for six or seven hours.

There was no financial gain from these offences, Docherty emphasised. He was in business with a friend of his who held the 0-licence and they had two vehicles. He part-owned the vehicle ha had been driving.

Fining Doherty, the magistrates said that the regulations were there to protect him as well as other members of the public. "We cannot have these monstrous wagons thundering down the motorway with you asleep at the wheel," they concluded.

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