News

A company that had operated without an O-licence since 2001 will only be granted a licence if its transport manager regains his repute by attending an FTA refresher course. North Western Traffic Commissioner Beverley Bell revoked the four vehicle licence of Ashbourne-based Carl Jeffrey. She will grant a new licence for only three vehicles and not the 10 vehicles and five trailers applied for by CPJ Environmental Services, of which Jeffrey is the sole director and transport manager, until he has  attended the refresher course.

For Jeffrey and the company, Paul Carless junior said there had been a change of entity into a limited company in June 2001. A licence application in April 2005 was stalled due to a lack of documentation and a fresh application was submitted in February. He agreed that no interim licence had been applied for. The operating centre had been changed around October 2006.

Jeffrey said that when the business became a limited company he had made a mistake in not realising he needed to notify the TC. He had passed the CPC examination in 1996 and was thinking of taking a refresher course. He was also looking at putting the assistant transport manager through the CPC course.

The TC said that in 2001 everyone but the Traffic Area Office had been notified of the change to a limited company and she did not accept it had been an oversight. The business had a substantial turnover of £1.5m. Jeffrey was not an unsophisticated businessman. The licence  had been renewed in 2006, declaring there were no changes, when Jeffrey knew in 2005 that he needed a new licence. No application had been made for an interim licence despite the Traffic Area Office asking whether they wanted one, together with a warning that the company had no authority to operate vehicles.