Could you quote a definition of a "disabled Pie"?
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My company is issued with trade plates as a motor trader and we have a breakdown vehicle which is a rigid platform vehicle capable of carrying a disabled vehicle loaded on the platform. The other day, we were asked to collect a car for repair which our employee refused to drive to our premises on the basis that it was not roadworthy: among other defects it had a bald tyre.
We sent our breakdown vehicle to bring it in under trade plates, but the driver was stopped by the police who contended that the vehicle being carried was not a disabled vehicle.
But how, otherwise, would we be able to rectify its faults?
AThis kind of situation is a contentious matter which crops up continually.
• There is no legal definition of a disabled vehicle on which to rely and it is always open to opinion whether the vehicle being carried is a disabled vehicle (which can be carried by a vehicle with trade plates) or goods (which can't).
Last year, a motor trader, who had two new cars to deliver, removed the rotor arm from the distributor of each vehicle, loaded them on to his
breakdown vehicle operated under trade plates and sought to deliver them in this manner. He was prosecuted for misuse of.
trade plates, for operating a vehicle carrying goods without an operation licence and for not keeping a driver's record of hours worked. He was convicted on appeal.
Though the magistrates took the view that the vehicles being carried were disabled vehicles, the appeal court considered that disabled vehicles are vehi
cles which suffer some disability other than simply having the rotor arm removed and the case was remitted to the justices with .a direction to convict.
The view of the appeal court might possibly be relied on in your case because obviously the vehicle you were carrying suffered from some disability other than a contrived mechanical fault. The reference is Robertson v Crew RTR (1977) 141.