The director of a haulage firm with operations in Shrewsbury and Coalville has been disqualified for two years after the Traffic Commissioner for the West Midlands, Nick Denton found that he encouraged drivers to commit offences to conceal drivers’ hours and broke the rules himself. He admitted that he had removed his tachograph card whilst driving and continued to drive illegally, even though he knew it was wrong to do so in order to make a delivery. The Traffic Commissioner also ruled that he would be disqualified from acting as a Transport Manager for three years with immediate effect. Mr Denton said: “This is not one of those cases where an operator, through naivety, ignorance or incompetence was unaware of the offences its drivers were committing. In this case, the controlling mind of the company, director and transport manager was instrumental in those offences, encouraging his drivers to commit them and structuring pay arrangements in such as way as to make them more likely to commit breaches.” Seven of the company’s drivers said they had been told to work when they should have been taking a rest or had to take their digital tachograph drivers card out and continue to drive without making a legal record of their work. Read the full story in Commercial Fleet.