Judge overturns TC's decision to disqualify Upper tribunal judge Jacqueline
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Beech orders fresh hearing for transport manager Stuart McAuliffe By Roger Brown Transport manager: Stuart McAuliffe Matter: Appeal Hearing: London Upper tribunal judge: Jacqueline Beech
UPPER TRIBUNAL judge Jacqueline Beech has allowed a transport manager's appeal against his disqualification and said the matter must be reheard by a different traffic commissioner (TC).
After an appeal hearing in July, Beech overturned the decision of Nick Denton, TC for the South East, when he banned Stuart McAuliffe in March from acting as a transport manager for three years.
McAuliffe became the nominated transport manager for Egham, Surreybased Ocean Xpress Logistics, authorised for one vehicle and one trailer, in 2009. Vosa began an investigation into the firm after a police encounter with driver Jasvinder Arora in August 2010. After inspecting his tacho equipment, the officer concluded that Arora had used another driver's name to conceal his excessive hours and insufficient rest. Arora initially claimed that a second driver, Manjit Dhami, had been driving and presented 40 tacho charts in Dhami's name. It eventually transpired that Dhami had never driven for Ocean Xpress. On one occasion, Arora drove for 18 hours and 20 minutes in a 24-hour period.
In August 2012, he was convicted at Ipswich Magistrates' Court for making 79 false records between May and August 2010 and sentenced to eight months' imprisonment. At the subsequent public inquiry (PI),
the TC revoked the Ocean Xpress 0-licence, disqualified Arora from driving trucks for two years and disqualified his wife, sole director of the business Shalini Arora, from holding an 0-licence indefinitely. On appeal, McAuliffe said the TC had handled the PI incorrectly, and that he was not given a chance to answer questions relating to how he had checked tacho records. He added that the TC gave too much weight to the Aroras' interpretation of his role at the business, and that the TC should have given more consideration to his version of events.
Beech said she recognised that the TC had to deal with a bad case of systemic falsification of tacho records over a protracted period. However, she concluded: "While a finding of loss of repute may have been justified, unless a transport manager is given an opportunity to answer specific concerns, the disqualification or the length of [it] may not be justified. Care must be taken to ensure the transport manager is given an opportunity to deal with the specific concerns that a TC has about the evidence, which may result in findings that automatically lead to the most draconian of orders." Summing up
The TC made significant adverse findings in respect of McAuliffe, but failed to give him an opportunity to address them all.