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Smiths of Whiteinch has lost its licence after fiercely disputing VOSA prohibitions for its vehicles. The licence was revoked and the company directors disqualified after tachograph charts showed Smiths used five vehicles under prohibition for speed limiters that VOSA said were faulty. The accuracy of VOSA's testing equipment came under fire at the Edinburgh disciplinary hearing when company solicitor Neil Kelly questioned two VOSA officials.

A video recording of speed limiter testing equipment  said by Kelly to show how easy it was for VOSA's handhelds to get it wrong was contested by traffic examiner Evelyn Hill, who issued the delayed prohibitions for Smiths' vehicles. She agreed that tachograph charts showed the speed limiters were working in the vast majority of cases, but declared that VOSA staff using the equipment to inspect Smiths' vehicles had not made a mistake.

Traffic examiner John Quinn said he was content the hand held equipment was working at the time of the inspection at Smiths' premises in December. But he conceded it is possible for inaccurate readings to occur for certain vehicles. He had checked another company's vehicle and reported a faulty speed limiter even though a road-test found it was functioning properly. Managing director John Smith denied compromising road safety, saying that extensive checks by Siemens VDO and vehicle manufacturers Scania and Renualt confirmed there was nothing wrong with the speed limiters.

He said that  after the prohibitions he found it impossible to hire vehicles and sub-contractors, and the business would not have survived if the vehicles under prohibition had remained parked up. Scotland's deputy traffic commissioner Richard McFarlane revoked the haulier's licence from November 3. He said that no hint must be given to the industry that the use of prohibited vehicles and trailers would attract anything other than the severest sanctions.