/4,400 fine for falsifying charts
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Two owner-drivers working out of quarries in North Wales have been ordered to pay fines and costs totalling 14,400 by Fhntshire magistrates after it was said they deliberately and systematically falsified tachograph records.
Prosecuting for the Vehicle Inspectorate, Albert Oldfield told the magistrates that these were the first of a series of similar cases that would be coming before the court, and the VI regarded it as a "very, very serious matter".
Kevin Jones, of Mold, pleaded guilty to 21
offences of falsifying tachograph records and one offence of using a vehicle without an 0-licence; he was fined £2,200. Ian Bailey, of Wrexham, pleaded guilty to 18 offences of falsification and was fined 21,1100. They were each ordered to pay £200 costs.
Oldfield told the court that these were specimen offences. Jones's tachograph charts showed rest periods when his vehicle was clearly on the move. It had also emerged that he cid not hold an 0-licence at the time.
Jones had admitted that he had taken the fuse out of his tachograph while weighing and loading at the quarries, saying the rates were terrible and he had found it very difficult to start up in business and make any money.
Appearing for Jones, Nic Parry said that following a bitter divorce, Jones had lost his job so he had bought a truck and looked for work. lie had taken a gamble because it was the only way he could make his business viable.
Oldfield said that Bailey, who ran three tippers, had also recorded rest periods that he knew to be false. Traffic examiners had seen that a wire fitted to the tachograph head had been interrupted with a plug and socket.
Bailey had said he had done this in a bid to make the vehicle pay after the quarries introduced a rota system which meant he lost a load a day. He had been trying to make up an extra load.