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Tribunal denies appeal for wage slip and tacho cheats
Page 20
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A Scottish waste disposal firm whose MD falsified wage slips to hide tachograph abuse by its drivers has lost its appeal against the revocation of its Operators licence. Kilsyth-based Ham° Environmental Services and its directors also remain disqualified from holding an 0-licence.
Scottish Deputy Traffic Commissioner Richard McFarlane had disqualified MD Samuel Torrens for three years and the company's other director, Suzanne Garnett, for 12 months.
6 6
The company, which is involved in specialist waste disposal, held a licence for four vehicles and four trailers. It was called before the DTC after dri vers working on a contract to remove raw sewage from the Rosyth naval base committed a series of hours and tacho offences, Appealing to the Transport Tribunal, the company argued that the DTC had been wrong to find that Torrens had personally told drivers to enter false names on tacho charts. There were no previous convictions and the admitted failings had not put road safety at risk. The circumstances had been unexpected and there had been a public health issue to be resolved.
it was pointed out that there was an exemption in the hours rules to cope with emergencies and this might have excused the extra hours.
Dismissing the appeals, the Tribunal found that the evidence implicated Tor-ens as the instigator. He was responsible for ordering the men to do the work and knew what it involved. He was aware of the need for relief drivers and the result of his
inability to find the
Falsifications was not an it lated event but had occurred two separate occasions.
The Tribunal said it vs hardly likely that the driv( would have entered false narr unless they knew they w( going to receive payment for extra hours worked. The pot ble exemption did not exct the falsifications, and ignorar of these offences highlight the company's apparent in ference to the accurate cc pletion of tachograph recor This was a bad case, Tribunal concluded so revo tion and disqualification wi inevitable. Three years Torrens and the company wa no way excessive and the DT conclusion that Garnett shc be disqualified for a year cc not be faulted.