Load fines are quashed
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• Fines imposed on Lancashire haulier David Haworth and one of his drivers for using a vehicle with an insecure load, have been quashed on appeal to Stafford Crown Court, Haworth, who trades as D&A Haworth, of Ileskin, near Chorley, had been fined £400 and driver Graham O'Neill £200, and each was ordered to pay £25 prosecution costs and had three penalty points endorsed on their driving licences.
O'Neill said he had collected a parked return load from Cwmbran consisting of metal lintels which had been bundled and secured by the manufacturer with metal bands. The bundles had been loaded by fork-lift truck, placed on skids and then securely roped. He then travelled to Birmingham, where he picked up some further materials which he covered with a net and ropes. He checked the bundles of lintels and found the ropes were still tight and the steel bands on each of the four bundles were still intact.
He did not stop again until flashed down by a motorist on the M6 when he discovered that a lintel had come out of one of the packs and fallen on to the roadway. A second lintel was loose in the back of the wagon and he found that one of the metal bands at the rear of the bundle had snapped. The bundle had splayed out allowing two lintels to escape.
Haworth said he had seen other hauliers carrying lintels loaded and secured in the same way. He was not aware of any other incident of insecurity of a load occurring due to a failure of steel banding.
Defending, John Backhouse argued that O'Neill had been entitled to rely upon the experience of the suppliers in the way that the bundles had been secured and placed on the lorry.
Quashing the fine and endorsements, and substituting absolute discharges, Judge Chapman said he accepted that the load was a normal one and had been secured in the usual way. It was common for bundles of materials to be held together tightly by steel bands and the driver's roping had been adequate.
He was satisfied that Haworth could not have known of the circumstances and that, on the facts, O'Neill had no reasonable cause to suspect that the load would become insecure.