BR'" Finances were in doubt
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• North Eastern Deputy Traffic Commissioner Brian Horner has adjourned a bid for an 0-licence by a company formed by the son and nephew of former Sheffield hauliers Noel and Ian Loukes.
In 1993 their licence was revoked after a fatal accident and they were disqualified indefinitely from holding a licence. LVH, of Old Colliery Yard, Mansfield Road, Waleswood, Sheffield, had applied for a new national licence authorising four vehicles and two trailers. The company had been operating under interim authority since January. The Road Haulage Association opposed the application on financial grounds.
For the RITA, Stephen Kirkbright said that the only financial document submitted with the application was a bank statement dated November 1996, in the name of Anton Loukes rather than the company-, showing a balance of £8,000. That would not even satisfy the test usually applied by Commissioners of £2,500 per vehicle. Kirkbright pointed out.
He added that the Transport Tribunal had specified that there had to be that amount of available capital per vehicle to cover the start up costs.
Kirkbright said that it cost substan tially more than £2,500 to put a vehicle on the road.
Anton Loukes said that he was the sole director and denied anyone else was involved in the business, He claimed that accounts had been sent to the Traffic Area Office a fortnight previously, but North Eastern Deputy Traffic Commissioner Brian Horner pointed out that the documents received were bank statements and invoices for work, Adjourning the proceedings, Horner advised Loukes to bring a witness with financial expertise the next time, saying that he would need clear evidence of the company's assets and income.
• Noel Loukes was jailed for two years in 1994 for procuring a driver to cause death by dangerous driving because of the state of the vehicle involved in the accident.
The propshaft of Loukes's lorry had disintegrated on the M1 and part of it hit an oncoming car, killing the driver. The lorry's driver was cleared of causing death by dangerous driving.
Loukes was freed after serving part of his sentence when the Appeal Court quashed his conviction on the grounds that he could not aid and abet the driver if the driver had been acquitted.