E J Meeks gets pat on the hack
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• E J Meeks was congratulated on the way it conducted operations, its well-kept vehicles and well-behaved drivers by South Wales Licensing Authority Ronald Jackson when he made no direction under Section 69 and renewed the company's South Wales licence at a Cardiff public enquiry.
The LA had been considering taking action in the light of a number of prohibitions and convictions. Director Robin Meeks said that three of the four immediate prohibitions had resulted from accidents. The fourth was in respect of a broken handbrake cable on a tanker trailer. As such trailers were never disconnected the handbrake was never used.
Dealing with 39 overloading convictions during the movement of coal to the Aberthaw power Station during the miners' strike, John Backhouse, for the company, said the use of a specific route had been a term of the contract.
There were no weighing facilities at the loading point and tickets given to the drivers were stamped with the instructions to weigh at Aberthaw.
Jackson said he appreciated the difficulties with that pathcular contract. Where the customer required the use of a specific route, however, it was up to the operator to take it up with the customer so that he be allowed to depart from the route to go to a weighbridge.