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Senior Traffic Commissioner Philip Brown says UK law has been

21st August 2008, Page 21
21st August 2008
Page 21
Page 21, 21st August 2008 — Senior Traffic Commissioner Philip Brown says UK law has been
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reinforced thanks to a Court of Appeal ruling on Belgian company Romantiek Transport.

Romantiek was regularly operating lorries in the UK without an 0-licence because, it argued, simply having EC authorisation from Belgium permitting cabotage in other member states allowed it to be exempt from UK licence rules.

However, as the criteria surrounding current cabotage rules include duration, frequency, periodicity and continuity of the work to gauge whether the operation is lawful, the appeal court upheld a transport tribunal decision that the work was not temporary and refused the return of the company's seven illegally operated trucks.

TC Brown says: "The Romantiek decision reinforces the position of the law, ie that companies operating in the UK require a UK operators' licence."

In a separate case, so far the first of its kind, Leyland-based Intramast (UK), a company controlled by Dutch firm De Rooy, was granted an international licence after it agreed to switch its maintenance to the UK from Holland (CM 29 May).

Vosa's concerns that its operation fell outside the cabotage rules prompted the original application for a licence by the company.

Transport lawyer Ian Jones says the TC was concerned that she could set a precedent, which appears to be backed in her decision. She had been alarmed at the company's original proposal to carry out safety inspections of the vehicles in Holland; at the Public Inquiry she foresaw that this could open the floodgates for more applications by foreign hauliers as the free market expands.

Brown says: "Transport operators who seek to operate in the UK, holding UK 0-licences, need to comply with the undertakings of those licences which require maintenance and transport management to be based in the UK."

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Organisations: Court of Appeal
Locations: Leyland

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