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Dock-side drink ruling
Page 122
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By Michael Jewell • A Crown Court judge has warned drivers moving their trucks off ferries into parking areas that if they have been drinking they can no longer claim they are on private dock roads as a defence against drink/driving charges.
Judge Derek Halpert allowed an appeal by John McGill, of Dungannon, against his disqualification from driving for 12 months after he had been convicted of drinking and driving by the Holyhead magistrates.
Caernarfon Crown Court heard that McGill had been drinking on the ferry on its passage from Ireland. He was stopped by the police some 50 yards after driving off the ferry and breathalysed.
Accepting arguments from John Backhouse, for McGill, that there were special reasons for not disqualifying him, Judge Halpert said there had been doubt as to whether the road leading from the ship to the dock entrance was a road to which the public had access. However, he had ruled that it was such a road (CM 24-30 October) and made it clear for the future that no-one else could be under the same misapprehension.
Judge Halpert said he accepted that McGill had not believed that he was laying himself open to a criminal offence by taking his lorry off the ferry for a very short distance to a place in the dock area where he could complete his daily rest period.