Whacking fine for fiddling tachographs
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A LANCASHIRE truck driver has been ordered to pay fines and costs totalling £1530 for hours and tachograph offences including the falsification of tachograph records.
Paul Bedford, of Leigh, pleaded guilty before the Rochdale magistrates to four offences of falsification, two of exceeding the daily driving limit, two of taking insufficient daily rest, and two of driving for more than 4.5 hours without the required break.
Prosecuting for VOSA, John Heaton said the offences came to light when three months' tachograph charts belonging to Bolton-based W Johnson Haulage were analysed by a traffic examiner.
He reminded the court that drivers' hours and tachograph regulations existed for the public's protection. In this case, said Heaton, Bedford had driven vehicles ranging from 7.5-17 tonnes.
Bedford said that some of the hours offences only involved 10 minutes. He had falsified a tachograph chart on one occasion after receiving a call from his mother and he wanted to get home quickly to see her. On other occasions he knew that he shouldn't have "driven in". Some of the offences had been committed in London where stopping was difficult.