I found your recent article on the subject of the regulatory landscape of restricted O-Licences and Section 19 and Section 22 permits interesting and of no real surprise.
Over the nine years that AS Miles Consulting has been in existence, we have had a number of cases, with fleets of varying sizes, with challenges over this type of work.
These have included:
- State and private schools
- Councils and other local authorities (LAs)
- Commercial companies running services for LAs.
I don’t think the blame can be solely laid at the lap of the Traffic Commissioners, but DVSA needs to hold its hands up to this too.
Operators find it very difficult to get consistent and referable advice.
Far too many times, DVSA will either say ‘it is up to the operator to decide if the system/process is correct, and we’ll let it know if we disagree’ or give verbal advice and never follow it up so the operator never has a benchmark or even defence if it is then called to a DVSA investigation, a desk-based assessment is sent out, or a call to Public Inquiry is issued.
Councils, too, have much to answer for here. All too often we see operators that are driven by councils to lower their costs, hence we see old vehicles with high repair bills and no auditing or annual checks.
Then, if something does go wrong, as we have seen ourselves with the cases we have dealt with in in the last 12 months, all hell breaks loose from the same council that consequently demands immediate action.
These are the same local authorities that, all the time, care only about the lowest possible cost for the services on which we put our children.
Myself and all the team at AS Miles Consulting agree that all types of O-Licence should have a qualified and nominated transport manager in order to operate lawfully.
Awaiting your next issue.
