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Licence appeal blows up in haulier's face
Page 6
Page 7
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• West Country haulier William C Hockln has had its Operator's licence revoked for the second time after its appeal against the original revocation spectacularly backfired.
In June last year, the Western Traffic Commissioner Philip Brown revoked the company's licence for 44 vehicles and 70 trailers and banned director William Hockin for a year in the light of the use of three unauthorised operating centres, widespread tacho offences and 43 cases of overloading. However, on appeal the Transport Tribunal quashed the revocation and disqualification orders, ordering that the matter be reconsidered by a different IC on the grounds that there was a lack of reasoning in Brown's decision.
However this time David Dixon, sitting as Western DTC, disqualified the company from holding a licence for two years. increased the disqualification of managing director William Hockin from one to two years, and disqualified the company's other director, Hockin's wife, for one year.
Following a two-day Public Inquiry, Dixon said that he had been told that such things could never happen again with the range of measures now in place. However, that amounted to a repeat of undertakings given previously. If the company had been given, and ignored, those undertakings in the past, it was not easy for him to believe in them this time, he said.
Its convictions demonstrated a complete failure of management controls within the company—it had had every opportunity to run a proper and safe operation and had failed to do so, he said.
The number and nature of the convictions against the drivers and the total loss of control of the operation by the company and its transport manager William Hockin led him to find that they had both lost their repute. He judged that it was too soon for that to have been regained.
Making the disqualification
orders, Dixon said that It would be wrong for the company or its directors to be able to re-enter the industry for a considerable time after revocation of the licence for such serious misdemeanours. Mrs Hockin was less involved than her husband but, as a director, carried the same legal responsibility for the conduct of the company.
He directed that the revocation and disqualification orders not take effect until 30 August to give sufficient time for the business to be closed down.