Court seeks details of flagging out rules
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• by Karen Mlles
An eagerly awaited test case on flagging out could still go ahead despite courtroom confusion last week over a prosecution brought by the Vehicle Inspectorate against a Scottish haulier.
At the hearing in Stirling, the Sheriff asked the prosecution for more information on the legal issues surrounding flagging out before he dealt with the case against Brought/ Ferry-based A&H kydd.
The company pleaded guilty to operating a vehicle without vehicle excise duty; the Sheriff will pass sentence on 7February Kydd's solicitor Michael Allen had argued that his client was a victim of the widespread confusion over the legality of flagging out to take advantage of lower VED rates in some European Union states while the operator's vehicle remains on its UK Operator's Licence.
A&,H Kydd's vehicle, which was used for domestic work and was on the company's Scottish 0-licence, was seen in August without a tax disc although the truck had been registered for ownership in Eire. The company had paid for an Irish tax disc from 1 August and was waiting to receive it.
But the Road Haulage
Association says if the case fails to produce legal clarity over partial flagging out, the government should activate another test case. "If these guys are pleading guilty to not showing a tax disc I don't think we're going to get much of a test case," says RHA Scottish regional director Phil Slanders,
The case comes as officials at the Department of Transport in London have fallen in with French and European Commission interpretation of European Union law over partial flagging out.
The DOT has accepted that hauliers registering vehicle ownership in another EU state to qualify for cheaper VED, but retaining the vehicles on their UK 0-licences, are probably breaking the law.
EU law forbids the crossborder hiring of trucks and the DOT has accepted that a UK company and subsidiary in another EU state would be informally hiring vehicles between themselves. "There is no difference between us and the French—we've both confirmed the same understanding of the law," says a UK source.
This development presents a further blow to hauliers trying to save money by partially flagging out, but it does not change the agreed view that flagging Out is legitimate for international operators with 0-licences abroad but remains illegal for domestic operators.
Over the past year the DOT has gradually hardened its interpretation of the law over partial flagging out. The number of fines brought by the French against UK operators caught running with Dutch VED has fallen since its autumn peak.