News

A recovery operator that had a trailer prohibited while attending a fatal accident has had its licence cut from 25 vehicles and 25 trailers to 10 vehicles and 10 trailers. The company had committed other maintenance offences and had run a separate skip hire business without an O-licence. Derbyshire-based Glossop Motors appeared before the North Western Traffic Commissioner Beverley Bell. She ruled that director and transport manager Paul Goddard has lost his repute as a transport manager and gave  the company six months to appoint a replacement.

Vehicle examiner Martin Garlick said that in 2007, three vehicles and a trailer were given prohibitions, the trailer having an immediate 'S' marked prohibition for loose wheelnuts. He had visited the company in June 2007 and March 2008. In 2007, there was no driver defect reporting system and maintenance records were incomplete. In 2008, a driver defect reporting system had been put in place but was not being used correctly. There were still details missing from the inspection records.

The company carried out maintenance for other operators and the premises were a station for the light vehicles testing scheme. He noticed skip vehicles operating out of the yard in AWD Skip Hire livery. Enquiries revealed that they were registered to Andrew Williams and were specified on the Glossop Motors licence. Director and transport manager Paul Goddard said that it had been the practice for drivers to report defects verbally. In March,  written records of reported defects were done centrally. They now had individual defect books in the vehicles. He gave an undertaking to appoint an additional transport manager by 1 August, one of whose responsibilities would be vehicle maintenance.

He had sold the vehicles engaged on general haulage to Jason Coombes who had been running that side of the business for some time. Around January 2007 he agreed to go into partnership with Williams in a skip hire business, with Williams running it. In June 2007 Williams lost interest and the partnership was dissolved. Glossop Motors was now operating the skip vehicles. He had not realised that the partnership required a separate O-licence.

Vehicle examiner Bernard Unwin said that in February he had attended the scene of a fatal accident at which Glossop Motors had been asked by the police to recover the car and laden tipper involved. He observed that an inner tyre on the low loader trailer being used to recover the tipper was under inflated. He was concerned that the outer tyre would be overloaded and could blow out. He prohibited the trailer until the tyre defect was rectified. The following day the tipper was taken to Bredbury test station from the company's premises on a different trailer. He was concerned that that trailer was overloaded and at Bredbury he noticed the test certificate showed an expired date.

Goddard said that they had been police recovery agents for about 28 years. He had checked the 12 tyres on the trailer before it went out. At the scene it was realised they would be overloaded and a request that the tipper's load be taken off was refused. The driver was instructed to proceed at low speed but the vehicle examiner said that he could not. The second trailer was a special types trailer exempt from testing. The TC said that it was unforgivable for an operator not to have a proper written driver defect reporting system and to not record defects and their rectification on the inspection records.

The TC believed Goddard did not want to get it wrong but his various business interests meant he spread himself too thinly. While not been a deliberate attempt to break the law he had been negligent.