ENFORCEMENT INVESTIGATION
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The Transport Select Committee, comprising MPs of all parties, has considerable influence on the legislation that governs road haulage. In the first of a series, Miles Brignall reports on the committee's investigation into enforcement...
The Vehicle Inspectorate painted a contradictory picture of how it functions at the opening session of the all-party Transport Select Committee investigating the adequacy of enforcement of regulations for trucks and coaches.
Published results of annual tests, computerised links between Traffic Area Offices and courts, and renewed pressure on magistrates to increase fines were all highlighted as measures that will improve enforcement, according to VI chief executive Ron Oliver and his civil service controller, Sophia Lambert.
But they admitted that hauliers given immediate prohibitions for potentially dangerous vehicle defects, and notices for overloading, are often not prosecuted as this is seen as a poor use of resources. Fines rarely reflect the number of man hours it takes to bring a case to court and are often dropped.
Committee members were surprised to hear that many owners of prohibited vehicles escape prosecution. Fines for overloading offences average £300, said Oliver, compared with a legal maximum of £2,500.
Committee chairman Paul Channon started proceedings by asking Oliver and Lambert if they felt the transport industry is as well regulated as the aviation industry. The committee then spent an hour quizzing the pair on the way the VI operates.
Lambert and Oliver described a number of planned improvements and talked about how the VI targets enforcement. It plans to start publishing lists naming those haulage firms with high failure rates at annual test with a view to shaming them into improving their maintenance records. Checks on potential operators could be stepped up, they agreed.
Oliver told the committee that the VI is placing more staff in areas where there are more operators. He denied that cutbacks have damaged enforcement and said that extra enforcement staff had been taken on.
0 ver the next few weeks witnesses from all sections of the transport industry will appear before the committee of 11 MPs. The Road Haulage and Freight Transport Associations will be among them, as will representatives of major haulage companies and an owner-driver.
This investigation is the first examination of the industry by the parliamentary transport committee since the early 1980s. Gwyneth Dunwoody, former cormnittee chairwoman and patron of haulage safety campaign Brake, is known to have a strong personal interest in the investigation.