Express Motors, of Penygroes, near Caernarfon which was involved in a crash in eastern France last July carrying teenagers to an Italian camping holiday, has been fined for drivers’ hours offences unconnected to the crash.
The company pleaded guilty before Caernarfon Magistrates to failing to ensure driver Melvyn Lane had sufficient rest and failing to record other work undertaken by him last July, a few days before the crash which involved a coach carrying 44 Gloucestershire teenagers, two of whom were badly hurt and others less seriously injured.
Express Motors was fined £1,250 and ordered to pay £600 prosecution costs and a £125 victim’s surcharge.
Mr Lane, of Porthmadog, who pleaded guilty taking insufficient rest and failing to record other work was fined £246 with £450 costs and a £30 victim’s surcharge.
Prosecuting for the DVSA, Anna Moran said that Mr Lane had failed to record that he had worked an 2330-0800hrs night shift with a GP out-of-hours service before starting work with Express Motors from 1415hrs to 2200hrs.
His period of rest had been only six hours, 15 minutes.
He told traffic examiners that because he was not physically driving a journey that day, being second driver on a coach journey to Leominster, he had not thought he had fallen foul of regulations.
For Mr Lane, Michael Strain said he had fallen three hours and 30 minutes short of the compulsory nine hours rest, but it was due to a lack of knowledge on his part.
For the company, John Heaton called it “a mix-up and misunderstanding.” Express Motors was fully aware that Mr Lane worked for the overnight GP service.
Fining both the company and Mr Lane, Magistrates Chairwoman Diane Arbabi said it appeared to have been an isolated incident but pointed out that the law was there to protect road safety.
