Resting before a trip 'is legal'
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• A driver is .entitled to take part of his daily rest period before starting a journey, Eccles magistrates have ruled.
The ruling was made after Charles Hocking, of Back Lane, Great Emerson, was cleared of failing to take a daily rest period between 6 and 7 April.
For the prosecution, Christine Graham said that when Hocking's tachograph charts were checked by a police officer, they revealed that he had finished work on 7 April at 00:12hrs and rested until 06:24hrs. That gave him a rest period of six hours and 12 minutes. He then carried on working until 15:53hrs.
The regulations state that a driver should take a daily rest of 11 hours, but that can be reduced to nine hours three times during the week, as long as it is compensated for. Alternatively, a 12-hour daily rest can be split up into two or three periods provided one is at least eight hours long.
Hocking said that his main occupation was a self employed mechanic. He worked as a driver on a casual basis. On the morning of 6 April he had fixed some brake pads onto his car, which was half an hour's work, which he finished at 11:30hrs at the latest. He picked up the vehicle at 19:30hrs that day, Defending, John Backhouse said the prosecution was saying that a rest of six hours and 12 minutes was taken which was impossible to make up. However, Hocking had not driven all week apart from this trip.
If the court was in any doubt about the meaning of the regulations, they should either give the benefit to the defendant, or take the case to the European Court to determine the exact meaning of the regulations, said Backhouse.