Knight licence refused
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• Scottish Traffic Commissioner Hugh McNamara has finally lost patience and refused to renew the licence held by Kilsyth-based James Knight Coaches, following Knight's seventh appearance at a public inquiry in eight years.
Knight's two-vehicle licence had been renewed for 12 months only at the most recent public inquiry, and the company had undertaken to inspect its vehicles every two weeks and to employ the Frieght Transport Association to make quarterly checks on them.
George McCallum, Bishopriggs' Vehicle Inspectorate operations manager, said that one of the vehicles had been given an immediate prohibition endorsed "neglect" when presented for annual test in July and an immediate prohibition had been placed on the second vehicle.
The FTA had then informed Knight that his contract had been cancelled because he had not presented his vehicles for inspection or paid his accounts. McCallum agreed that he had no criticism of Knight's premises or facilities, but it had taken four attempts to clear one of the prohibition notices, he said.
Knight's son-in-law, John Murphy, said that he was to blame for cancelling the FTA contract. He had taken certain steps to make the business financially viable and he had not appreciated that the FTA contract was part of an undertaking given to the commissioner.
Knight told the inquiry that he had had three part-time mechanics in the past 12 months and McNamara commented: "If you pay peanuts you get monkeys." Murphy said that he did not regard £3.20 an hour as "peanuts".
Revoking the existing licence, and refusing the renewal application, McNamara said that he had come to the end of his tether, not least because Knight had been running unsafe vehicles for years. He might have been prepared to accept the excuse that he had been let down by his mechanic once or twice, but not eight times. If Knight could not control his mechanics he was not fit to hold a licence. He had been given every opportunity to demonstrate that he could operate safe vehicles:the amount of latitude extended to Knight had been phenomenal, and he could not think of any other traffic commissioner who would have been so lenient. It was a history beyond parallel in the passenger transport industry. Knight's performance had been abysmal and he was not convinced there was going to be any improvement.
McNamara directed that his decision should not take effect until the end of February to give Knight time to dispose of his business.