The “de facto” director of park-and-ride firm Winford Parking and Rental of Bristol, Dean Baldock, was disqualified from holding or obtaining a PSV O- Licence for five years after the company’s two-vehicle restricted licence was revoked by Traffic Commissioner (TC) Kevin Rooney. The TC also similarly disqualified the named directors, Ryan and Kirstie Baldock, for three years.
The company was called before the TC because of the circumstances surrounding its conviction on three offences of permitting a person to drive a vehicle on the road without the correct licence entitlement, three offences of using a vehicle without insurance and two offences of using a vehicle without the correct MoT certificate in force. The company was fined a total of £8,000.
Dean Baldock said that he was now a statutory Director, the notification having been made the previous day. He had taken over the business in 2014 and had run it in the same way as it had been run previously. He hadn't been aware of the company's convictions until he saw the Public Inquiry (PI) bundle. He intended to apply for the case to be re-opened.
Mr Baldock’s son, Ryan Baldock, said that he ran the meet-and-greet service at Bristol Airport – he had nothing to do with the O-Licence.
In his decision the TC said that it was clear that Dean Baldock had acted as a de facto director of the business for some time. Ryan Baldock clearly had little knowledge of the operation of vehicles. It was clear from the absolute lack of knowledge of his son that he had been the controlling mind of the transport operation since the licence was granted in December 2014. Kirstie Baldock did not attend the PI and her name was never mentioned.
In summary, vehicles have not been subject to preventative maintenance inspections for 2.5 years; there was no evidence of any driver defect reporting; vehicles have been issued with roadworthiness prohibitions; one vehicle has been operated for months to years without the benefit of a Certificate of Initial Fitness; neither vehicle was tested to the standard required of a vehicle used for hire or reward; and drivers had, on multiple occasions, driven without the necessary licence entitlement. One driver was specifically permitted to do so having already been stopped and interviewed by DVSA.
As a result, vehicles have been used without valid insurance; drivers have repeatedly driven without the necessary Driver CPC; the stated operating centre had not been used; an unauthorised operating centre has been used; and correspondence addresses had not been maintained, causing significant difficulty to the enforcement agency.
There had been a failure to co-operate with DVSA. An unlicensed, linked entity now appeared to be operating the vehicles, at least some of the time.
He considered that Dean Baldock knew that this operation was grossly non-compliant and had blatantly ignored all attempts by the enforcement agency and the police to bring it in to line. The failures were severe. Members of the public had routinely been put in danger. This was an operation that needs to be stopped before someone was killed.
