a I am about to start sugar beet haulage
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with a lorry which has been plated at 18 tons gross. The haulage is going to be difficult to judge for weight owing to the different amounts of soil content an the sugar beet. The distance from my home village to the sugar factory is 18 miles and I pass two weighbridges but these are not publicly owned. If arrived overweight and the Ministry men should be there, could I be prosecuted ? Am I allowed a certain amount of overweight ?
AWe appreciate the difficulties in judging
the weight of a bulk load such as sugar beet, particularly if it is covered in wet or clay soil. Your responsibility so far as overloading is concerned is to have the vehicle weighed at the nearest available weighbridge. If you are caught with an overloaded vehicle, it is a good defence to say truthfully that you were on your way to the nearest available weighbridge, or going from the weighbridge to the nearest suitable off-loading place.
What you should do is ask the owners of the two weighbridges which you mentioned whether they will let you weigh there; if they won't, you could not reasonably be expected to travel a great distance out of your way to find another weighbridge, but you would not then have the -proceeding to the nearest weighbridgedefence to an overloading charge. The responsibility for legal loading lies on the vehicle operator. No margin is permitted, but it is a good defence to prove that the weight increased by not more than 5 per cent although no one had added to the load since it was first loaded and weighed, and that the vehicle was not overloaded to start with. This concession is intended primarily to allow for loads which gain weight by absorbing moisture, but would only be valid where the excess weight was not more than 5 per cent.