Two-week ban over tachos
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When Bagilt, Flintshire-based tip
per operator Clifford Corbett appeared before Welsh Traffic Commissioner David Dixon at a Mold disciplinary inquiry, the IC remarked that 600 people a year died in accidents with trucks, often because the driver was tired. That, he said, was the reason for the drivers' hours and tachograph rules.
Wrexham magistrates had fined Corbett £1,800, with £200 costs, after he pleading guilty to 22 offences of falsifying tachograph records.
Traffic examiner Geoffrey Whitley said that an analysis of Corbett's tachograph charts and delivery notes showed the tachograph was being tampered with, journeys were not being recorded in their entirety and off-road driving was being concealed. The charts had been falsified by pulling the fuse, which also rendered the speed limiter inoperative.
Corbett said he could not remember doing this much while on the road; it had happened mainly when waiting in queues in the quarries.
The TC commented that Corbett might find the drivers' hours rules frustrating, but they had been designed because they were necessary for road safety.
Suspending Corbett's two-vehicle 0-licence and his HGV driving licence for two weeks, the TC said the offences were serious, but he took account of Corbett's previous good record in the six years he had held a licence.