Decision

Decision for Centro Waste Ltd and others

Published 8 October 2021

1. WEST MIDLANDS TRAFFIC AREA

2. DECISION OF THE TRAFFIC COMMISSIONER

3. PUBLIC INQUIRY HELD IN BIRMINGHAM ON 16 SEPTEMBER 2021

4. OPERATORS:

5. PAUL JARVIS T/A CRANE IT LICENCE OD0251812

6. H W TARONI (METALS) LTD LICENCE OD0260479

7. APPLICANT: CENTRO WASTE LTD

8. FORMER SOLE TRADER: ERIC GOWLAND LICENCE OD1024766

9. Background

9.1 DVSA investigation

In August 2020 DVSA vehicle examiner Paul Matthews and traffic examiner Kathrine Cox commenced an investigation to establish who was operating HGVs from premises at 145-154 Nechells Lane Birmingham. At least six HGVs were observed entering and leaving the premises: none of them was specified on an operator’s licence. The vehicles were all registered to Centro Waste Ltd or Pimlico Trading Company Ltd, neither of which company held an operator’s licence.

145-154 Nechells Lane was however listed as the operating centre of Eric Gowland t/a Dial A Skip, standard national licence OD1024766. In August 2020 three vehicles were specified on this licence, none of them the vehicles which had been observed using the premises. Of the three vehicles, two vehicles’ MOTs had expired in October 2019 and the other vehicle’s MOT had expired in February 2020, suggesting that they were no longer in use. Two of these three vehicles were registered to Pimlico Trading Company Ltd; the other was listed as transferred to the motor trade.

The DVSA examiners visited the Nechells Lane premises on 14 October 2020. There was no sign of Eric Gowland. A Colin Wilson stated that he was the “general manager” and informed them that Eric Gowland was living in the West Country (Exeter, it later transpired). The DVSA examiners sent a Section 99 letter to Mr Gowland, asking him to produce records.

DVSA was subsequently contacted by transport consultant Charlie Ahmed of Invergold Associates who said that he had been contacted by “the operator” with a view to assisting in the response to the Section 99 letter. The email from Mr Ahmed to TE Kate Cox was copied to centrowaste@bt.connect.com and to no other person. In a further email dated 30 November, Mr Ahmed stated that Eric Gowland had not operated any vehicles since 2018 when the then transport manager Wayne Hollyoake had resigned (although this loss of a transport manager had not been communicated to my office at the time). Numerous subsequent attempts by DVSA to contact Mr Gowland and Mr Hollyoake came to naught: all correspondence went unanswered. Mr Ahmed himself never managed to speak to Eric Gowland at any stage and, in the absence of any instructions, ceased his involvement in May 2021.

On 15 October 2020, one day after the DVSA examiners’ visit to the Nechells Lane premises, vehicles FD65 LFX and FD65 LGG, both registered to Centro Waste, were specified on licence OD0260479 held by H W Taroni (Metals) Ltd (“Taroni”). On 19 October 2020, vehicles BD68 CBO, BV66 VYP and BD68 CVN (all registered to Pimlico Trading Co Ltd – “Pimlico”) were specified on licence OD0251812 held by Paul Jarvis t/a Crane It. Kathrine Cox noted that Mr Jarvis did not have the waste carriers licence from the Environment Agency necessary to transport skips.

On 22 October 2020 an application was created on the online system for Centro Waste Ltd, with an operating centre at 145-154 Nechells Place. The application was merely created on the system, it was never submitted to the central licensing office in Leeds (“CLO”). On 1 April 2021 Centro Waste created a new application for a standard national licence for 8 vehicles. This time the application was submitted to CLO.

Meanwhile, TE Kathrine Cox turned her attention to Colin Wilson and Centro Waste Ltd (of which he was the sole director). An interview proved difficult to arrange because of Covid restrictions: Mr Wilson instead provided a prepared statement dated 26 April 2021. In it he stated that he was not aware of any of the vehicles in question having operated from the Nechells Lane premises. If they were being operated, this should have been under Eric Gowland’s licence. The fact that none of the vehicles was specified on Mr Gowland’s licence was a matter for Mr Gowland, not for him (Mr Wilson). The reason why FD65 LFX and FD65 LGG had appeared on Taroni’s licence on 15 October 2020 was that an agreement had been reached for Taroni to purchase the vehicles from Centro Waste. He could not comment on why the vehicles registered to Pimlico had been specified on Paul Jarvis’s licence on 19 October: Pimlico merely rented part of Centro Waste’s yard at 145-154 Nechells Lane. Mr Wilson had no legal or beneficial interest in Pimlico.

TE Cox’s subsequent attempt to contact Pimlico elicited no response. On 24 May 2021 she visited the premises of Fleetcare Ltd who had presented for MOT the vehicles registered to Centro Waste and Pimlico referred to above. Fleetcare told her that they had always dealt with a person known as Colin: they did not know an Eric Gowland.

TE Cox’s report, submitted to me in June 2020, concluded that Centro Waste Ltd had been operating vehicles without a licence and that, as a consequence of the DVSA visit in October 2020, the vehicles had then been specified on other licences. The implication was that these other operators (Taroni and Paul Jarvis) were not the true operators of these vehicles but had lent their licences to Centro Waste.

9.2 Additional information – Paul Jarvis

DVSA’s reports also stated that:

Paul Jarvis had in fact been operating as a limited company Kwik Fab Ltd, of which he was the sole director, rather than as a sole trader. Kwik Fab had been incorporated in 2005 and when Mr Jarvis’ licence had been renewed in 2009 CLO had queried whether the operating entity was in fact Kwik Fab Ltd. Mr Jarvis had stated that he was still operating as a sole trader, which had proved to be untrue.

there was no evidence that any form of brake test was being carried out on the vehicles;

the MOT initial failure rate was very high, at 40% compared to a national average of 15%;

Mr Jarvis had stated to DVSA that he had been approached by Colin Wilson asking if he would like to take on two skip vehicles and give it a go. He had hired the vehicles from Pimlico on the basis of a verbal contract. It was an open-ended agreement. His failure to obtain a waste carriers licence was an oversight;

Mr Jarvis had parked the two vehicles at the Centro yard in Nechells Lane while they were on his licence, as he did not have room for them in his own yard;

maximum tachograph download intervals had been exceeded and Mr Jarvis had been unable to produce any tachograph records for the Pimlico vehicles during the period they were on his licence (22 October to 27 November 2021);

Mr Jarvis told DVSA that he had taken the vehicles registered to Pimlico off his licence after he had been advised to remove them by the RHA.

9.3 Additional information- Taroni

DVSA’s reports also stated that:

the preventative maintenance inspection dates had been missed by up to five weeks on several occasions;

all vehicles had several driver detectable defects recorded on the safety inspection sheets, with the immediately preceding driver defect report recording “nil defect”. This strongly suggested that the driver defect reporting system was ineffective;

one vehicle had been reported at being on the legal limit for tyre tread depths at a safety inspection on 11 December 2020. On 22 December 2020 the DVSA had issued an S-marked prohibition (denoting a serious failure in maintenance) to the same vehicle for two bald tyres: clearly no action had been taken following the safety inspection;

the prohibition rate, at 67%, was high compared to the national average of 26%;

there was no evidence that the operator was abiding by its undertaking, recorded on the licence, to carry out periodic random audits of driver defect checks;

the operator had failed to provide the mandatory response to the notice of shortcomings, despite two reminders being sent. DVSA had evidence that these reminder emails had been opened and read by transport manager Harry Taroni;

although Taroni claimed to have sold the vehicle FD65 LFX on 15 January 2021, they had nevertheless presented it on 25 January to their maintainer M6 Commercials to put through its MOT.

Concerned by these reports, I decided to consider Centro Waste’s application at a public inquiry, along with the licences held by Taroni and Paul Jarvis.

9.4 Eric Gowland

In the meantime, I had become aware that Eric Gowland’s licence was without a transport manager and also apparently without Eric Gowland, who could not be contacted by either DVSA or his own consultant. This was not a situation which I could allow to continue. A “propose to revoke” letter was therefore sent from my office on 20 May 2021. No reply was received and the licence was accordingly revoked on 17 June 2021. In view of the suspicion that Mr Gowland had lent his licence to Centro Waste, disqualification from holding a licence in the future was an issue which I wished to consider, so Mr Gowland was also called to the public inquiry for this purpose.

10. Public inquiry

The conjoined public inquiry was held in Birmingham on 16 September 2021. Present for Centro Waste Ltd were Colin Wilson (director) and Dominic Green (prospective transport manager). The company was represented by Mahan Manu of ESN Solicitors. Paul Jarvis attended, represented by Andrew Woolfall of Backhouse Jones Solicitors. Present for Taroni were Harry Taroni (director and transport manager), Richard Taroni and Russell Taroni (both directors). The company was represented by Laura Newton of Smith Bowyer Clarke. DVSA vehicle examiner Paul Matthews and traffic examiner Kathrine Cox were also present. Eric Gowland failed to attend or make any contact with my office.

10.1 Evidence of Colin Wilson

Mr Wilson gave evidence to the effect that:

Centro Waste was a broker, taking bookings for skips and assigning them to sub-contractors, among them Eric Gowland t/a Dial A skip. Centro Waste had some 3.5 tonne vehicles which delivered empty skips and picked up the smaller skips.

Centro Waste had had an arrangement with Eric Gowland under which Mr Gowland had run vehicles belonging to Centro under his licence. The arrangement had not been documented, nor had any invoices been issued or any money changed hands, because “he was doing his own work and tipping in my yard and we set one off against the other”.

the reason for one of the vehicles being sign-written in the livery and contact details of Centro Waste was that it had been a marketing trial. The vehicle had still been operated by Mr Gowland.

the fact that the bodies of the other vehicles, though not sign-written, were in the same light blue colour scheme of Centro Waste’s skips, did not indicate that they were operated by Centro Waste.

asked why the Centro Waste website contained so many reviews commenting on its skip pick-up and delivery service and referring to “Colin” if it did not actually operate such a service, Colin Wilson said that customers would probably not know that the service had been contracted out to others.

he (Mr Wilson) had believed that Mr Gowland had properly specified the vehicles on his operator licence. He had not thought to look to see if discs were in the windscreens.

he had arranged with Taroni in October 2020 that they would acquire vehicles FD65 LFX and FD65 LGG. The vehicles had been specified on Taroni’s licence on 15 October 2020 and the purchase had been completed on 7 November 2020. He could not explain why the vehicles were showing on DVLA records as “transferred to the motor trade” rather than to Taroni. Taroni had paid £16,000 cash for the two vehicles so he could not provide bank statements showing that payment had in fact been made.

asked why Centro Waste’s application for an interim licence had given as a reason “loss of work for vehicles over 3.5 tonnes” if Centro Waste was not actually operating such vehicles and therefore did not stand to lose such work, Mr Wilson said that this referred to future loss of work if the application were not granted.

accepting that there was no legal link between Centro Waste Ltd and Pimlico Trading Ltd, I asked if there was any link between Colin Wilson and the director of Pimlico, Lisa Payne. Mr Wilson said that Ms Payne was his life partner.

the nominated transport manager in Centro Waste’s application was Dominic Green. I noted that the bundle for Paul Jarvis’s licence contained an audit of that licence by Mr Green in which Mr Green had recommended that driver cards be downloaded every 30 days (ie two days more than the legal limit).

10.2 Evidence of Russell Taroni

Russell Taroni stated that vehicles FD65 LFX and FD65 LGG had at first been hired from Centro Waste. No hire documents existed and no payment had been made, because Taroni had very quickly decided to purchase the vehicles. In the event, however, they had not been used much and had been sold on at a profit in January 2021 to a Matthew McGregor. He could not explain why the vehicles were still showing as “transferred to the motor trade”. He produced a receipt from the Post Office showing that vehicle tax had been paid in cash at the post office on 7 November 2020. I noted that the receipt was attached to a similar receipt showing that tax had been paid in November 2019, more than a year before Taroni acquired the vehicles. Richard Taroni also supplied a copy of a letter he had written to a Matthew McMcregor (sic) on 22 January 2021 asking him to update the keeper records at DVLA, as Taroni had never received new V5 certificates after buying them in November 2020.

I asked Russell Taroni why, if the two vehicles had been sold to Mr McGregor, they had been seen by DVSA still in Centro Waste colours, parked in the Taroni yard on 2 March 2021. Mr Taroni said that they must have been visiting his yard for some reason. I asked why the two vehicles on Paul Jarvis’s licence until 27 November 2020 had been seen parked in the Taroni yard on 15 December. Mr Taroni said that they must have been visiting his yard for some reason.

Mr Taroni accepted that the drivers of the two vehicles he had first hired then purchased had previously been employed by Centro Waste (a statement which was fairly damning to Centro Waste’s claim not to have operated any vehicles) but said that Taroni had quickly taken over their employment. Payslips were produced in evidence. Preventative Maintenance Inspection sheets for the vehicles during the hire period also recorded the operator as “Taroni”.

Asked why he had presented a vehicle for MOT on 25 January 2021 10 days after he had sold it, Mr Taroni said that he always sold his vehicles in a good state and that an MOT pass had been part of the deal.

Asked why he had not earlier replaced the tyres on the vehicle which had been given the S-marked prohibition for two bald tyres on 22 December, Mr Taroni explained that the driver who had been detailed to go off and get new tyres had decided to save the operator money and not do so, and had not informed the operator of this.

10.3 Evidence of Paul Jarvis

Paul Jarvis accepted that since his licence had been issued in 2005 his business had changed and that the operating entity had become Kwik Fab Ltd. He had not appreciated that the company would need its own licence; he had thought it simply ported over. When DVSA had investigated his licence in autumn 2020 he had reverted to a split operation, with transport arranged by him as a sole trader.

Mr Jarvis said his transport manager CPC qualification dated from 1989. He had never undertaken any form of refresher training, although was now booked on a refresher course in November 2021.

In October 2020 he had been approached by Colin Wilson who asked if he wanted to get back into skips. He thought he would try it out, but lacking the necessary vehicles, had hired two vehicles from Lisa Payne at Pimlico. The hire agreement was not documented but verbal. In the event the vehicles had carried out little work so Mr Jarvis had terminated the hire on 27 November 2020. He accepted that he did not possess the necessary waste carriers licence and that the vehicles had been driven uninsured for around a week, as the 28 day grace period for adding vehicles to his insurance policy had expired on 20 November. He also accepted that he had not locked in the tachograph data in the vehicle units when he had taken over the vehicles.

I reminded Mr Jarvis that the two vehicles had been seen in Taroni’s yard on 15 December 2020 still displaying the Paul Jarvis discs. Why had he not returned the discs when he took the vehicles off the licence? Mr Jarvis said he thought he had taken the discs out.

10.4 Concluding submissions

For Centro Waste, Mr Manu noted that the company had been in the waste business as a broker for many years. It was of good repute and there was no reason not to grant its application for a licence. The prospective transport manager Dominic Green had attended a CPC refresher course.

For Taroni, Laura Newton maintained that there was no evidence to justify a finding that they had lent their licence to Centro Waste. Indeed, there was substantial evidence to the contrary in the form of payslips, receipts and maintenance documents. The operator accepted that compliance standards had been permitted to slip, partly as a result of being forced to move premises by HS2 construction work. The operator had been co-operative and had engaged a transport consultant (Chris Samways) to help improve compliance before it had been called to the public inquiry. She accepted that the undertaking related to gate checks on drivers had not been fulfilled, but this was now being addressed. The operator had incurred an S-marked prohibition for the bald tyres but its MOT pass rate was excellent (27 passes out of 29 presentations) and its drivers’ hours record was good. Ms Newton suggested that any action beyond the removal of the margin would be disproportionate: the operator was also willing to give undertakings on training for the directors, laden roller brake tests, the retention of Mr Samways’ services and an independent audit in 6-12 months time.

For Paul Jarvis, Mr Woolfall accepted that the operator was not as up-to-date as he could be. Mr Jarvis was booked on a two-day CPC refresher course with the RHA in October. He had spread himself too thinly, acting as driver, transport manager, company director and vehicle fitter. He intended to recruit another driver or appoint an external transport manager. He was prepared to have a further audit from the RHA [rather than Dominic Green, whose audit I had severely criticised as sparse and inadequate]. Although Mr Jarvis could not show any documentation as evidence of the hire arrangements, the lending of a licence was a serious allegation and there needed to be strong evidence to justify such a finding. The operator could live with a reduction to two vehicles if necessary; if I found it appropriate to remove Mr Jarvis’s good repute, he asked for a period of grace in which to appoint a new transport manager.

11. Considerations, findings and decisions

11.1 Centro Waste Ltd

I found Colin Wilson to be a wholly unreliable witness. His answers to my questions were evasive, disingenuous and at times downright mendacious. His case against DVSA’s accusation that Centro Waste Ltd had been the true operator of Eric Gowland’s licence was that there had been an arrangement between Centro Waste and Eric Gowland for Mr Gowland to use Centro Waste’s vehicles and that the value of the vehicle hire had been exactly offset by what Mr Gowland owed Centro for tipping waste in the yard. There is no documentary evidence of any kind to support this, not even a witness statement by Mr Gowland (which one might have expected if Mr Wilson’s account were true).

All the evidence points the other way. The five or six vehicles in question are all registered to Centro Waste Ltd or to Pimlico Trading Ltd, a company controlled by Colin Wilson’s partner. They are painted in the distinctive light blue colour of Centro Waste and one vehicle is sign-written in Centro Waste livery. They were presented to Fleetcare for MOT by Colin Wilson. Russell Taroni referred to taking on Centro Waste drivers when he took over two vehicles. When DVSA first attempted to contact the nominal operator at the premises Eric Gowland, the consultant engaged, Charlie Ahmed, copied his emails to DVSA to Centro Waste. Eric Gowland lives in Exeter, is 92 years old and is uncontactable. It defies credulity to suggest that he is still a functioning operator licence holder in Birmingham. In summary, the HGVs run from the Nechells Lane premises look like a Centro Waste operation, quack like a Centro Waste Ltd operation and waddle like a Centro Waste Ltd operation. I find that they are indeed a Centro Waste Ltd operation.

Because Centro Waste Ltd has operated vehicles without a licence, and because its director Colin Wilson has woven a tissue of lies to try to conceal this, I find that neither director nor company are of the required good repute to hold a standard national licence (Section 13A(2)(b) of the 1995 Act refers). I am thus refusing the application.

11.2 H W Taroni (Metals) Ltd

I accept that there is some evidence (see paragraph 18 above) to support the claim that Taroni was the operator of the two vehicles registered to Centro and specified on the Taroni licence on 15 October 2020. There are still some suspicious elements which throw doubt on the claim – for instance the evidence that Taroni paid the vehicle tax on 7 November shows only that someone paid cash at the post office. There was no explanation of why the receipt dated 7 November 2020 which Taroni provided to the inquiry was attached to a post office receipt for vehicle tax dated 1 November 2019, 12 months before Taroni took possession of the vehicle. And Russell Taroni’s explanation for the presence in his yard in March 2021 of the vehicles (still in blue Centro livery) which he had supposedly sold to Mr McGregor in January – that they were “just visiting” – was, frankly, risible. And there is something strange about the account according to which the operator first took the vehicles on hire, then was so enthusiastic about operating them that it bought them, then found that there was so little work for them to do that they sold them shortly afterwards.

I do not want to leave Russell Taroni with the impression that he has successfully deceived me with this baloney. But I do find that there is insufficient evidence for me to be able to conclude, on the balance of probability, that Taroni has lent its licence to Centro Waste.

By contrast, I find that there are clearly significant shortcomings in compliance by Taroni with requirements relating to maintenance and roadworthiness of vehicles. It is extraordinary that a safety inspection on 11 December 2020 found two tyres at the limits of legality and that nothing was done to rectify this, with the result that DVSA issued an S-marked prohibition to the vehicle for two bald tyres 11 days later. The operator blamed a driver brain-fade for this failure, but it is the operator’s responsibility to ensure that urgent maintenance is carried out.

I also find that the company has failed to fulfil its specific undertaking to carry out random audits of driver walk-round checks, with the result – clearly seen from numerous driver detectable defects on the periodic preventative maintenance inspection sheets – that driver defect reporting has become ineffective.

I further find that the operator has failed to fulfil the promise – given on application - that vehicles would be given a safety inspection every six weeks: the DVSA report shows that, for example, vehicle 9729R, was eight weeks overdue for inspection when it received a check in March 2020, and exceeded the six week interval by four weeks in December 2020. One of the vehicles taken from Centro Waste in October 2020, FD65 LGG, also exceeded the six week inspection interval by four weeks in December 2020.

I find that the operator failed to respond to DVSA’s notice of shortcomings, despite being reminded to do so. DVSA provided evidence to show that transport manager Harry Taroni had received both emails.

12. Balancing act and decision

On the more positive side of the balance are the operator’s excellent MOT pass rate and apparently good drivers’ hours oversight. I have weighed these elements in the balance against the negative elements set out in paragraphs 33-36 above. I conclude that the operator’s conduct falls into the “serious to moderate” category defined in the senior traffic commissioner’s statutory document 10. The starting point for the “moderate” category is a 14 day suspension, and for the “serious” category a 28 day suspension. I consider that a suspension is an appropriate and proportionate outcome given the serious failures in the maintenance and driver defect reporting systems outlined above, the failure to fulfil the undertaking concerning random checks of drivers and the operator’s double failure to respond to DVSA. I am thus imposing a 14 day suspension, towards the lighter end of the scale. I am giving the operator four weeks notice until this comes into effect, to allow time for alternative arrangements to be made. I am also making a direction that the operator’s vehicles must not be used under any other operator’s licence during the period of suspension. Taroni must also, after the suspension has finished, provide me with tachograph unit reports from each of its vehicles showing mileage during the suspension period.

I conclude that Harry Taroni – just – retains his good repute. Although he has clearly failed to exercise the required degree of effective and continuous management in all areas, performance has been patchy – some aspects of the operation are better run. But he should be clear that he would not retain his good repute as a transport manager if a future inquiry found similar shortcomings.

12.1 Paul Jarvis

I find that Paul Jarvis has lent his licence to Centro Waste. The vehicles registered to Pimlico Trading which were specified on his licence were not kept at his operating centre and were not insured by him; their tachograph data was neither locked in nor analysed by him. He did not have a licence to carry waste himself and did not apply for one. Mr Jarvis was unable to produce any documentary evidence in support of the supposed hire arrangement with Pimlico or show any movement of funds.

I further find that Paul Jarvis has operated in the wrong entity for at least the past 12 years. Although holding the licence as a sole trader, the operating entity has in fact been Kwik Fab Ltd, a company of which he is the director. I find that he misled CLO in 2009 when he stated that he was still operating as a sole trader.

I find that Mr Jarvis has failed to fulfil his undertakings (Section 26(1)(f) of the 1995 Act refers) to keep vehicles in a fit and serviceable condition (there is a 40% MOT failure rate) and to ensure that the rules relating to drivers’ hours and tachographs are observed (maximum permitted download intervals have been missed).

I find that Paul Jarvis lacks good repute (Schedule 3 paragraph 1 of the 1995 Act refers). A person who has lent his licence to an unlicensed company and who has operated in the wrong entity for over a decade while misleading CLO about this cannot be of good repute. There are significant shortcomings in the way in which he has operated his own vehicles. I have found very little to put on the positive side of the balance beyond promises of an audit and training in the future (see paragraph 27 above). He also stated that he had reverted to operating HGVs separately from Kwik Fab Ltd as a sole trader, but this conversion has come too late.

12.2 Decisions

Having found that Paul Jarvis is not of good repute, I must disqualify him under paragraph 16 of Schedule 3 from acting as a transport manager under any licence. His knowledge as a transport manager has been woefully lacking: he has completely failed to keep abreast of developments in legislation and best practice since he qualified back in 1989. The mere passage of time cannot cure such failings: I am therefore disqualifying him indefinitely from acting as a transport manager. If ever Mr Jarvis wishes to act as a transport manager in the future he must first retake and pass the transport manager CPC examination. The disqualification will take effect at the same time the revocation of the licence takes effect (see paragraph 47 below).

Having disqualified Paul Jarvis as a transport manager, that leaves the operator without professional competence (Section 27(1)(a) of the 1995 Act refers). I have reflected upon Mr Woolfall’s request to allow a period of grace in which to appoint a new transport manager but in the light of Mr Jarvis’s conduct have decided not to grant one. I have found that Paul Jarvis is not of good repute: this applies to him both as operator and transport manager. Where an operator loses his repute, revocation of the licence is mandatory (Section 27(1)(a) again).

In arriving at this decision, I considered the Priority Freight and Bryan Haulage questions. First, how likely is it that Paul Jarvis will comply in the future? Given that he has operated in the wrong entity for over a decade and sought to conceal that from CLO, that he has lent his licence to an unlicensed operator, and that he has failed to make any concrete improvement to his operation in advance of the public inquiry, I do not consider this at all likely. A negative answer to the Priority Freight question tends to suggest a positive answer to the Bryan Haulage question of whether an operator deserves to go out of business. In this case, I am afraid that he does.

I considered whether to make a Section 28 disqualification order against Mr Jarvis in his capacity as an operator. In the end, I just held back from this, primarily influenced by the fact that he did not lend his licence to Centro Waste for a long period of time (although he did fail to take back the o-licence discs, thus allowing Centro Waste to continue to display at least the outward sign of possessing an operator’s licence). It may be that, with a competent and reputable modern-day transport manager on board, having attended operator licence management training, and having delegated the functions of maintenance and driving to others, Mr Jarvis might succeed in regaining his repute as a potential operator. But first he needs a period out of the industry in which to reflect, retrain, and rebuild my trust.

I am revoking Paul Jarvis’s licence with effect from 0001 hours on 1 November 2021.

12.3 Eric Gowland

I find that, through negligence or deliberate act, Eric Gowland has allowed Centro Waste Ltd to use his operator’s licence. He has failed to answer any correspondence either from DVSA examiners or my office. I have already revoked his licence OD1024766 and now disqualify him under Section 28 of the 1995 Act from holding or obtaining an operator’s licence in the future, and from being a director of a company holding or obtaining such a licence. The disqualification is indefinite.

Nicholas Denton

Traffic Commissioner

30 September 2021