A transport manager has won an appeal to have his disqualification reduced from three years to two.
Upper Tribunal Judge Alan Gamble cut the period of disqualification for Savpreet Singh Aulakh, aged 23, who had been part-time transport manager for two years at Wolverhampton-based Plan A Logistics. He did so given Aulakh's relative youth and inexperience as a transport manager, and the fact he had not been the "controlling mind" of the operation.
Plan A Logistics had its O-licence revoked in April this year following a Vosa investigation into vehicle hire and maintenance arrangements at the business.
In a written decision, following public inquiry (PI) in Birmingham, traffic commissioner (TC) for the West Midland traffic area Nick Jones disqualified boss Derek William Woolley from holding a licence for five years.
TheTC also disqualified Aulakh as a transport manager, saying he might be able to return after three years when he had re-taken and passed fresh transport managing examinations.
Aulakh had produced false documentation to Vosa with an intention to deceive, as did the operator.
That documentation related to the maintenance records of vehicles, the hire of vehicles and warnings given to drivers.
The appeal was only against the decision of the TC to impose a three year disqualification period on Aulakh, and Judge Gamble said that the TC's ruling relating to the company would stand.
Judge Gamble added: "It is appropriate, in our view, to make a greater distinction than that made by the TC in his decision between the period of disqualification imposed on the operator (five years) and that imposed on the appellant."
