BE" Munro tad° offences by Michael Jewell • The last
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two of a number of Allen Munro Transport drivers to be prosecuted for offences involving the falsification of tachograph records have appeared before Ormskirk magistrates. The charges arose out of a joint police and Vehicle Inspectorate raid on the company's premises in 1995.
Stephen Maguire, of Ormskirk, pleaded guilty to two tachograph chart offences. He was fined a total of £150 and ordered to pay £100 prosecution costs.
Stephen Kirkbright, for Maguire, said Allen Munro drivers were paid a flat wage each week of £300, so there was no financial incentive to drive for longer than they should. This was not a case of a driver deliberately falsi fying his record in order to drive longer than the regulations permitted, putting the public in danger, said Kirkbright. Maguire had just made mistakes.
William Brown, of 63 CasterIey, Claybrow, Skelmersdale, pleaded guilty to six offences of falsification and seven of using a false instrument. He is currently serving a four-year prison sentence, having been con victed of smuggling cannabis into the country in his lorry, Richard Green, prosecuting, said that Brown had admitted winding the clock back, pulling fuses, altering dates on tacho charts, running without a chart in the tachograph, not recording ferry journeys, using a false name and tearing up charts.
Michael Heggarty, for Brown, said there was pressure on the driver to get the job done.
Brown had said that he had not been told by the company to falsify his records but that there had been pressure to get the load there and get back, said Heggarty.
The magistrates gave Brown a conditional discharge for two years after hearing that as a serving prisoner he had no income.