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No problems on the road
Page 19
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Lorry drivers with emotional problems have been told to either put them out of their minds completely when behind the wheel or stop driving.
This was the message from West Midland Traffic Commissioner David Dixon when he suspended the HGV driving licence of Staffordshire driver Gary Chance for a period of three weeks.
Traffic examiner David Doolan told a Birmingham Public Inquiry that a vehicle belonging to Walsall Wood-based Jona Haulage had been stopped in a check.
When Chance produced his tachograph charts a number of drivers' hours infringements were obvious on the face of the charts.
During a subsequent investigation Chance's tachograph records for 12 months were examined and as a result he was later convicted of two offences of falsifying tachograph records, three of exceeding 4.5 hours' driving without taking the required break and six of taking insufficient daily rest.
Questioned by Michael McKnight, for Chance, Doolan said that out of 189 of Chance's tachograph charts only 13 gave rise to prosecutable offences.
Chance said that he had personal problems and everything had "gone haywire" for a time. He had not gained from the false records, he said, it was due to emotional problems at the time.
In reply to the TC, he said that he now realised that he should have taken two or three weeks off whilst his problems were ongoing.
However, Dixon said that it sounded to him as if Chance had been totally ignoring the rules and had "a pretty irresponsible approach" during the period concerned.
Suspending Chance's licence, the TC said that he had failed to heed warnings given by his employer.
It was quite unacceptable for a professional driver to allow emotional problems to affect his conduct on the road, he said. It was difficult enough to drive a lorry on the road at any time without being distracted by other matters, Dixon added.