Trips too far in day • Drivers employed by Derby
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shire haulier Barlow & Hodgkinson were forced to do round trips to Sheerness and back in a day to benefit the firm's managing director who behaved "very badly".
In a case at Derby Crown Court, Judge Robert Orme said that it was because of pres by the managing sure put on drivers been broken director—who was financial not prosecuted and whose name was not mentioned in court —that he felt able to deal with them leniently when seven of the company's former drivers admitted falsifying tachograph charts.
The judge added that the company's managing director had benefited most from the offences and this was "quite disgraceful conduct".
Laprell said the system of payment might be illegal and that to pay more than" 50% of earnings as a bonus tempts a driver to exceed hours limit& The company's accounts for the year ended March 1991 showed assets of about £1 million and a cash bank balance of £1.48m—Barlow could not claim that the law had been broken out of financial necessity, said Laprell.
He added that two of the drivers had disconnected the electrical supply to the tachograph by use of an isolator switch, until they got to Leicester Forest Service Area. They effectively saved themselves two hours in a day. Another driver had failed to record a journey between Derbyshire and Newport, losing around seven hours. Defending, Calder Jones said that the drivers were told to do the run in one day or they would be sent home. Owen Cundy, of Mackworth, Derby, was given a conditional discharge for two years; Richard Godfrey, of Ashbourne, was fined £500; Ronald Steeples, of Ashbourne, £150; James Buxton, of Biggin, £250; George Glover, of Brailsford, £100; David Needham, of Chesterfield, £100; and Ian Clayton, of Ashbourne, £50. Each of the drivers was also ordered to pay £100 towards the costs of the prosecution.