Decision

Decision for Mulholland International Limited (OH2010362) and Mulholland Tippers Ltd (OH2034386)

Published 26 April 2021

0.1 MULHOLLAND INTERNATIONAL LIMITED (OH2010362)

0.2 MULHOLLAND TIPPERS LTD (OH2034386)

1. PUBLIC INQUIRY IN BRISTOL

1.1 21 JANUARY 2021

2. BACKGROUND

Mulholland Tippers Ltd (“Tippers”) submitted an application on 22 June 2020 for a standard national goods vehicle operator’s licence authorising the use of four vehicles from an operating centre at West Town Road, BS11 9DE. The sole director is Patrick Mulholland the nominated transport manager is Wendy Mulholland. The establishment address is Flat 8, BS23 4NJ. On the application form (which was not in my bundle so I have referred to the electronic record) Mr Mulholland declared:

Patrick mulholland director of P&J mulholland ltd held operators licence for 8 years for this company which went into voluntary liquidation 7/2/19 redacted . The operators licence was surrendered before the liquidation commenced . insolvency practitioner : Robert john coed orchard st business centre, 13-14 orchard street Bristol BS15EH

Mulholland International Limited (“International”) is the holder of a standard international goods vehicle operator’s licence granted on 14 March 2018 and authorising the use of six vehicles and two trailers from an operating centre at West Town Road, BS11 9DE. The sole director is Wendy Mulholland and the nominated transport manager is Wendy Mulholland. The establishment address is Flat 8, BS23 4NJ. The company was incorporated on 6 July 2017.

Patrick Mulholland was director of P & J Mulholland Limited (“P & J”) which held a standard international operator’s licence authorising the use of 8 vehicles and 3 trailers from an operating centre at Third Way, BS11 9YL. The licence was offered for surrender on 28 August 2018 and that was actioned on 14 October 2018. A proposal to strike the company off the register was made on 11 December 2018 but this was suspended following a petition. The company entered insolvent voluntary liquidation on 7 February 2019.

The declared insolvency caused the application to be referred to me. I was concerned that the Statement of Affairs for P&J Mulholland Ltd indicated that the Crown was by far the principal creditor being owed £55,216 of the £87,652 shortfall. Trade creditors amounted to only £8,577 and I was concerned that they may have been preferred. I was also concerned that the new application might mean that Mulholland International Ltd was in financial distress so I called both the new application and the existing licence to public inquiry.

3. THE PUBLIC INQUIRY

Patrick Mulholland and Wendy Mulholland attended the inquiry represented by Elizabeth Caple, solicitor. I received a substantial bundle in advance including a chronology of events. The compliance documents raised serious concerns for me.

Proceedings were recorded and a transcript can be produced as required. I do not record all the evidence here, only that which is necessary to come to a decision. In producing this written decision, I have listened back carefully to the entire recording as well as referring to my own notes.

3.1 Preliminary matters

redacted.

redacted

redacted

3.2 The evidence of Patrick Mulholland

Mr Mulholland confirmed that he adopted the written chronology as his evidence. He needed a new licence to live; he and his wife were going their separate ways. He and his wife were separated. They had planned to sell their property but Covid had put that on hold. It would take him a month or six weeks to get the business ready to operate; paperwork, tyre companies and general. He would sell a car and buy a vehicle or novate a vehicle from a finance company. One of the drivers had agreed to come across from International, they were both sons in law and had come out of the army.

Work was earth-moving. P & J was incorporated in 2011 with him and his son. His son had now gone his separate way. The business grew on the back of offers for work for people such as Carillion and Costain which required new Euro 6 vehicles. They had been promised some work on the Heads of the Valleys in Wales but they were then told that only local Welsh operators could work there. He had moved to Bristol for work. The vehicles cost more than he earned. In 2018, he sold the vehicles and paid drivers, suppliers and for the operator’s licence.

He tried everything he could to keep it going, down to one vehicle driving it himself. He was doing tyres and everything himself to save money working seven days a week but had to sell the vehicles because of the money he was earning. In 2018, he was advised that he had to liquidate the company. There had been no contracts. Big companies had used him for years.

The main debt was to HMRC. He sold the vehicles and that included VAT but he used that to pay the finance company and others such as the tyre company. He planned to carry on working to pay the VAT back later but he just couldn’t afford it. Rates had been cut; bills got out of hand so he was advised to liquidate. He was devastated. He had put in a lot of work for deposits for the new vehicles – which cost redacted. Other vehicles were on order, but he cancelled them. The plan had been to grow the company, so he didn’t need to drive any more. He should have taken advice from a transport solicitor earlier but all he knew was how to driver lorries, fix lorries.

His wife came into P & J doing administration. She had been a cardio-thoracic nurse and gave that up to look after their children so she could do this work from home.

He got offered artic work in Bristol. It was completely different work from tippers. For convenience, it was better to separate the businesses and run them through separate businesses with his wife running the artics and he the tippers. So International was set up in 2017. It would have been turmoil to run both the artics and the tippers together. International was in the name because he had been offered work in Ireland. But there was no work and the vehicles were parked up.

Mr Mulholland didn’t have time to take days off to open bank accounts, so his wife was to run International. In January 2018, P & J took advice from Grosvenor Park and gave his wife authority to speak with them. He was out at work all the time. He didn’t do emails. He only took what pay he needed to get by and wasn’t paid every week. His advisors saw that International might be a tool to keep the business operating. That hadn’t been his intention. He hadn’t been advised to draw up a plan for VAT. As 2018 progressed, it was clear that rescue wasn’t possible.

International took on one vehicle from P & J, there was finance on it. It had to be sold as the finance was too much against the rates he was earning. Most vehicles were sold at a loss. They were on finance, not leased. He had wanted to own them outright. Mrs Mulholland had stayed as sole director of International because Mr Mulholland just wanted to be a driver. He didn’t want to be involved with finance.

Mr Mulholland attended the operating centre in the morning to see which drivers were in and let his wife know. Mrs Mulholland then did all the planning. If he gets a new licence, the work is self-billing and he had someone in an office who could help him. He would get an accountant who could do the wages.

With hindsight, he would not have bought new vehicles without getting a solicitor involved. He now fully understood why he was at public inquiry. That had not been apparent to him before he received the call-in. They just wanted to go their separate ways. International was set up just for the artic work, not to allow the failing business to continue.

There had been no deliberate intent with him not being a director of International. He just didn’t want anything to do with artics.

Mr Mulholland accepted that he would benefit from training on walk-round checks. He had been trained wrongly previously. Stephen Helps would help him set systems up. He did most of the admin himself. It was self-billing and someone in the B & A office would help him. He would not buy new vehicles in the future.

I asked Mr Mulholland why he was not a shareholder of International. He said he didn’t know what a shareholder was. He just wanted to run tippers. He didn’t want to own anything. He wanted nothing to do with it. I noted that he appeared agitated.

3.3 The evidence of Wendy Mulholland

Mrs Mulholland adopted the chronology as her evidence. She was sole director and shareholder on International. Grosvenor advised that she be sole director and shareholder in 2018 but had always wanted the businesses separate so that’s why it was set up that way. She wanted to keep International running as it was. She was operating three vehicles at the moment and that was all that was needed.

Her role in the business since July 2018 was to liaise with the customers to get the work and check that they had the drivers and vehicles for it. Then she would get the work for the following day. She was in contact with B & A’s transport manager throughout the day. She dealt with the accounts department, book-keeping, all the day-to-day running. She would liaise with the operations manager if she wasn’t happy with the rates.

It was never asked or queried why she was the sole director. There was no deliberate act to avoid liabilities. Grosvenor House appeared to have some understanding of operator licensing but there had been no discussion about how the business was structured. Her husband was employed as a driver, he did a lot of work on the ground making sure the vehicles were roadworthy. She would offer an undertaking that her husband would have no control over the business. She would need more help from the drivers to allow that to happen. Either of the drivers could be more involved.

Mrs Mulholland accepted that there were issues that she needed to act on. On drivers hours and working time, she had all the Novadata software and since the PI came about, she had looked in to them doing the reporting so that she would get infringement reports. These would be weekly reports. She had not previously been able to produce reports. She could see infringements and she would phone the driver to see what had happened. There had only been minor infringements. The drivers started at 6 in the morning, finished by 4.30. There was no weekend work at all.

She was now better aware of the need for brake testing and she would come to an agreement with AVB to bring a vehicle in loaded. They had their own roller brake tester. A CPC refresher training course was booked in a couple of weekends time. She would also attend a one-day operator licence training course and be present at the training to be delivered by Mr Helps.

I asked Mrs Mulholland about her involvement with P & J. Initially it was informal help with admin. As it grew, he asked for more help. Initially that was just admin, dealing with the accountant. As the business grew, she took her CPC to become transport manager. She dealt with Grosvenor Park who dealt with the liquidators so that her husband could carry on working. The VAT money had been paid to settle finance and Mr Mulholland hoped to earn it back. Grosvenor had advised to pay off as much debt as possible. They hadn’t been advised to pay everyone equally.

I asked more about what tachograph analysis had been undertaken. Driver cards were downloaded every twenty-one days since the licence started. Vehicle units were normally downloaded at sixty days. There had been no analysis of missing mileage as the software wasn’t capable.

I asked about the contract with the maintenance provider, AVB. I asked what the agreement was when defects were found. They would just repair minor things and would call her for anything more significant. I put it to Mrs Mulholland that the pattern appeared to be that vehicles were inspected, more or less on time, defects were identified and reported and only actually rectified at the pre-MOT inspection. I took Mrs Mulholland through the inspection for redacted on 10 October 2020 when eight defects were identified and only two very minor items were rectified. The action on the others was “report”. The declaration of roadworthiness was unsigned. There was no brake performance recorded. At the pre-MOT inspection three weeks later, defects are still present and only then rectified. I took Mrs Mulholland to the maintenance records for redacted. On the pre-MOT inspection on 5 October 2020, seventeen significant defects need repair. Mrs Mulholland could not assist. On the next inspection, three further defects, none of which is rectified and no declaration of roadworthiness. Again, Mrs Mulholland was unable to assist.

On redacted, ten tyres had to be replaced prior to the MoT having been recorded as “U/S” (that is, unserviceable) by the technician. In addition, there were fifteen further defects that required attention before the vehicle could be presented for MoT. Mr Mulholland wanted to interject but I reminded him that he had no role in the International business. Mrs Mulholland told me that her husband did a lot of the defects.

Driving licence checks were done online every 6 months but no records were kept.

International was incorporated in July 2017 but they didn’t have any vehicles so didn’t apply for an o-licence. I put it plainly to Mrs Mulholland that she was aware in 2017 that P & J was in difficulty financially, so the new company was incorporated. However, there was still a chance that P & J would survive so they had not invested in an o-licence application until it was clear that P & J was doomed. Mrs Mulholland told me that they wanted to have two separate businesses for two different types of work. I put it to her that merely made things more complicated, and she remained as transport manager for both. I said again that I did not understand that argument, it was not one I had heard before.

Mr Mulholland was eager to return to vehicle redacted and told me it had been bought in that condition and they had repaired all the defects. I noted that the inspection was on 18 November, but the vehicle had been driven by “Ben” on 2 November according to driver defect reports. Mr Mulholland said Ben had probably picked it up and it might have been used a couple of days. I noted it had been used on 2nd, 5th, 9th, and two other days according to the defect reports. Mr Mulholland told me that the tyres were changed before it was used but could not account for why ten were marked as unserviceable on 18 November.

3.4 Closing submissions

Ms Caple told me that her instructions throughout were that International was never set up as a device. It was accepted that aspects of the history were confusing but that did not mean it was dishonest. They had been very honest about the VAT. Mr Mulholland had asked his wife to assist with the liquidators and it was accepted that she had taken on a role beyond that. Everything was done on advice and it was accepted that they did not have the knowledge and there had never been an attempt to deceive.

A number of aspects supported the argument that International was designed to be a stand-alone business. No licence had been applied for as there had been no work.

P & J had been a voluntary liquidation and that was important. The Senior Traffic Commissioner’s guidance identified a different approach to a voluntary liquidation.

International desperately needs to keep the licence. The impact of regulatory action was obvious, three vehicles were needed and I was invited to consider a curtailment. Mrs Mulholland would undertake to have assistance from a transport consultant. She had previous significant health problems particularly during lockdown. All the issues were fixable. There would be training. An audit undertaking would be offered. Mr Mulholland had been a great assistance with dealing with running defects. She would also offer an undertaking that Mr Mulholland would have no management role. He was planning to leave in any event. A two-day refresher course was booked. If the licence was to be revoked, there would need to be a 2 – 3-month run-off period.

The new application needed two vehicles. The significance of the past events was accepted. Mr Mulholland was not a serial abuser. There had been no previous compliance concerns. He had made decisions with professional advice. Decisions could have been made differently such as the VAT, but the significance was not understood at the time. He was not an unscrupulous individual. He would need support and will attend training and will have a separate transport manager in time. There was significant support.

3.5 Further submissions submitted via email 1 February

After I had started drafting this decision, I received further unexpected submissions from Ms Caple consisting of an e-mail and some attachments. In summary, they confirmed that some of the training had happened, that both parties would be willing to change company names and that the maintenance provider had now been told to rectify all defects. I am not able to ask questions about them directly to the parties other than by way of correspondence which I am not prepared to do after an inquiry has closed. I have a concern with any statement to a maintenance provider that all identified defects can be repaired in that it provides a blank cheque. It can also permit repairs that are not economically sensible. It having arrived unsolicited and after the inquiry closed, I afford it little weight. In the event, I do not believe that anything turns on it.

4. CONSIDERATION AND FINDINGS OF FACT

Prior to entering liquidation, P & J sold assets. The price included an element of VAT. P & J’s role at that time was to take that element of the money received that was VAT and pass it to HMRC. It was not P & J’s money to use for any other purpose. That it did so is tantamount to theft. I find that P & J preferred trade creditors, creditors on whom a successor business would need to rely. That is certainly not the behaviour one expects of the holder of a standard goods vehicle operator’s licence.

Patrick Mulholland claims this was done under advice from Grosvenor Park, a business consultancy. He left dealing with Grosvenor Park and, subsequently, the liquidators to his wife. When pushed on the point, Wendy Mulholland told me that Grosvenor Park’s advice was simply to pay back as much as possible. She did not go as far as to say that they told her, or her husband, to use the VAT money inappropriately. Patrick Mulholland was keen to lay the blame for the business failure and associated behaviour at the foot of others. He had been misled in to buying Euro 6, London-compliant, vehicles. He had been misled in believing that work was available for them. He had been misled in to believing there was work available on the Heads of the Valleys Road in Wales and claimed that work was retained for Welsh hauliers, with no substantiation of such a claim. The work in Bristol was insufficient to cover the cost of the finance on new vehicles – but that was not his fault. He claimed to have been advised to use VAT money to pay suppliers, although there is no evidence of that and Wendy Mulholland did not confirm that.

The reality is that Patrick Mulholland was the sole director and shareholder of P & J which entered insolvent liquidation owing the tax-payer £55,216. The insolvency was the result of decisions he took as statutory director. He used the tax-payer’s money to keep suppliers, he mentioned tyre companies, sweet for the future. I find that to be a calculated and cynical act.

I am told that International was conceived to deal with different work using articulated vehicles on containers and potentially running to Ireland but that work never materialised. Patrick Mulholland told me that he moved to Avonmouth after the promised work in the Midlands did not materialise. The Western licence was applied for in April 2016 and granted in July 2016 so I take that as being around the time of the move. Patrick Mulholland told me that the rates in Avonmouth were never enough to cover the cost of the finance on the vehicles. So the company knew in mid-2016 that it had financial concerns.

International was incorporated in July 2017. From Patrick Mulholland’s oral evidence, P & J was moving in to a difficult position at that time with vehicles having to be sold because the rates being paid in Avonmouth did not cover the finance. Wendy Mulholland was sole director and shareholder and I am told it was to be a business in a different sector but the work did not materialise. The argument for having a separate business was that haulage with artics was a very different operation and running it through a separate entity would be simpler. I heard no logical support for that argument. Crucially, the person responsible for continuously and effectively managing the transport operations of both P & J and International was transport manager Wendy Mulholland. Running two separate operations causes significant added complexity. Vehicles and drivers cannot readily be shared without the need for careful administrative actions to cross-hire, cross-invoice and respecify. There are twice as many contracts for maintenance, for tyres, for fuel, twice as many tax returns, double the number of accounts that have to be kept. It is an entirely illogical step to take if keeping operations simple is the objective.

I asked Patrick Mulholland why, even if he did not want to be a statutory director of International, he was not a shareholder. He told me that he didn’t know what a shareholder was. Coming from someone who has been in business as long as he has, I find that unbelievable. He gave me a description of the work that was intended to be undertaken by International, the differences in operation between container work and tippers and generally appeared very knowledgeable about the business. It makes no sense that he would not own any part of it and he offered no meaningful explanation.

However, in the context of one failing business, incorporating a new company provides a potential way forward. The licence application was made in January 2018. This appears to be on advice from Grosvenor Park. When the licence application was made, there was a clear intention to use International as a means of continuing the failing business. The licence is granted in March 2018 and increased in authority in August. P & J is surrendered in October and distress begins to show at Companies House in the form of a strike-off petition.

Ms Caple asks me treat the liquidation as less serious because it is voluntary. She refers me to the Senior Traffic Commissioner’s Statutory Document No.10 where, in relation to my powers to take action, it cites them in relation to a business entering insolvency as follows:

(f) that an individual licence-holder has been adjudged bankrupt or made the subject of a Debt Relief Order or, a company holding a licence has gone into liquidation (excluding voluntary liquidation);

That passage of the Statutory Document is seeking to summarise the powers in Section 26(1)(g) of the 1995 Act which correctly reads as follows:

(g) that the licence-holder, being an individual, has been made bankrupt or has had a debt relief order (under Part 7A of the Insolvency Act 1986) made in respect of him] or, being a company, has gone into liquidation, other than voluntary liquidation for the purpose of reconstruction;

The final clause “for the purpose of reconstruction” has been missed from the latest draft of the Guidance. But the legislation has precedence, and its purpose is logical. A liquidation for the purpose of reconstruction will be a solvent liquidation. A voluntary liquidation is simply one where the director(s) make the decision to enter into liquidation themselves. I imagine it rarely feels “voluntary” as the term is used in the normal course of events. The alternative might be where a creditor files for administration or liquidation. I find no reason to distinguish between the two. It is the insolvency that is the issue, and the behaviour before, during and after the entry in to liquidation.

I find it more likely than not that International was incorporated as a device to allow the family business to continue. I have set out my reasons for that above. I remind myself that, whilst I work to the civil burden of proof, the more serious the allegation, the more cogent the evidence needed to support such a finding. Whilst the finding that International was incorporated as a device is not beyond any reasonable doubt, it was accepted by both Wendy and Patrick Mulholland in oral and written evidence that applying for a licence for that company was “a useful business option” (chronology para 10). I find very strongly that the operator licence application for International was a device to allow the family business to continue should P & J ultimately fail.

Wendy Mulholland’s role in all of this is clear from the fact that it was she who dealt with Grosvenor Park and the liquidators and she was the sole shareholder and director of International. She made the licence application. She did so in the knowledge that it might provide the “useful business option”.

Wendy Mulholland was not a statutory director of P & J. However, she undertook the administrative management and paid the bills. She knew full well that she was using tax-payer’s money to pay business creditors.

I turn now to compliance matters of the existing operator. In relation to drivers’ hours, Mrs Mulholland accepts that no analysis has been undertaken of the vehicle unit data to see if vehicles have been driven without a driver card inserted. That is a crucial part of any analysis. Whilst the nature of the operation is such that infringements of daily and weekly rest are unlikely, that is not the case for potential breaches of continuous driving time or working time. If a driver is smart enough, and especially should he or she know that the vehicle unit data is not being analysed, it is reasonably straightforward to record no infringements on the driver card. Her management of drivers’ hours has been fatally flawed.

Mrs Mulholland told me that she checked driver licences online every six months. If that is true, and there is no evidence as printouts are not retained, then it is not perfect but also not worthy of serious concern. Normal industry good practice is to check all licences every three months with a risk-based approach to increasing checks where drivers have endorsements.

It is the maintenance of the vehicles that is my primary concern. The pattern repeats itself over each vehicle. Defects are reported by the contractor, but no action taken. The number of defects appears to increase check on check until the MOT when everything is rectified. This inspection of redacted on 10 October 2020 is typical:

image redacted

There is no brake performance assessment at all (pre-MOT inspections do have a laden roller brake test). Six of the defects are actioned only by “report” to the operator. The declaration of roadworthiness is therefore not signed. It is the transport manager’s job to make sure that no vehicle re-enters service until it is signed-off as roadworthy.

Vehicle redacted was inspected prior to its MOT on 18 November 2020 at 405,720 kms. The following defects are recorded:

• 10 tyres u/s (that is, unserviceable)

• Sideguards damaged

• Holes in wings

• N/S/R sidelight inop

• Rear reflective tape damaged

• Rear indicators white

• All brake shoes low

• N/S slack adjuster u/s

• O/S and N/S rear suspension pins (defect not fully described)

• Play at o/s 2nd king pin (monitor)

• Power steering hoses perished

• Drivers seat belt frayed

• Cracks in windscreen

• Washer jets blocked

• Heater control seized

• 2x steering ball-joint boots split

• Play in n/s/f track rod ball-joint

• Air leak under battery box (tank replaced)

• O/S ABS valve leaking

That is twenty-nine individual defects, of which only two were not so bad that the item needed immediate replacement. The unserviceable slack adjuster almost certainly meant that one wheel had no working brake. All the brake linings needed to be replaced. Patrick Mulholland told me that the vehicle had been bought in that condition and this was its first inspection in their ownership. The problem with that contention is that this inspection took place on 18 November and there are driver defect reports for the vehicle dated 2, 5, 9, 10, and 12 November. On 2 November, the odometer reading is 401,858 kms. I do not have defect reports for October so do not know whether the vehicle was driven prior to 2 November but the evidence is that it was in service and covered at least 3,862 kms working for International in what appears to be an absolutely shocking state.

Vehicle redacted was driven on five occasions by driver “Ben” prior to its 18 November inspection. Ben records no defects. It would seem to me that Ben isn’t very attentive when conducting his daily walk-around checks. A defect in one or maybe two tyres could be missed depending on where they are. But in ten tyres? At the very least, I would have expected him to notice that the heater controls were seized – it was November. It is clear from all the evidence in front of me that serious, driver-reportable defects are present at many safety inspections but go unreported. Vehicle redacted had broken wheel studs on 3 November 2020, driver Collins(?) fails to note them on the previous Friday, 30 October.

These are all matters that are readily apparent upon a simple review of the maintenance documents. It is clear to me that Wendy Mulholland has been grossly incompetent as transport manager. The operator was called to public inquiry on business reasons and Mrs Mulholland was not called as a transport manager. Had she been, she would no longer be a transport manager. Training has since been undertaken but the serious shortcomings before me do not take a vast amount of skill and judgement. They just need someone to take a slight interest. No-one should ever receive a PMI such as that for redacted on 18 November 2020. If they do, it should be a red alert to the transport manager that urgent and serious action must be taken. This transport manager did nothing. I have no hesitation in finding that the licence undertakings in relation to managing drivers hours, vehicle maintenance and drivers walk-round checks have been breached severely and Section 26(1)(f) is made out.

I summarise my findings. In relation to the application, Patrick Mulholland consciously used tax-payers money to prefer commercial creditors who would be future suppliers for the new business. He was party to the decision to make the application for International which allowed the family business to continue. His involvement was not on the face of that application so the business appeared clean.

In Aspey Trucks Ltd 2010 – 49, the Upper Tribunal comments on the difference between finding a loss of repute in an existing haulier and whether or not a new applicant to the industry met the standard to be of good repute:

“In a case such as this, the Deputy Traffic Commissioner was not looking at putting someone out of business. Rather, he was deciding whether or not to give his official seal of approval to a person seeking to join an industry where those licensed to operate on a Standard National or Standard International basis must, by virtue of S.13(3), prove upon entry to it that they are of good repute. In this respect, Traffic Commissioners are the gatekeepers to the industry - and the public, other operators, and customers and competitors alike, all expect that those permitted to join the industry will not blemish or undermine its good name, or abuse the privileges that it bestows. What does “Repute” mean if it does not refer to the reasonable opinions of other properly interested right-thinking people, be they members of the public or law-abiding participants in the industry?”

Patrick Mulholland is the sole director and shareholder of Tippers. It is therefore appropriate that I pierce the corporate veil. His conduct of preferring trade creditors over the Crown during the insolvency of P & J is such that his good repute fails to be established, notwithstanding that he has now come clean about how the Crown debt arose.

The position with International is different in law in that it is an existing operator, and I must apply a different test as helpfully set out by the Upper Tribunal. The first part of that test is to answer the “Priority Freight” question: how likely is it that this operator will, in future, operate in compliance with the operator’s licensing regime. I find that, at the current authority, that is unlikely but that it could be achieved with a significant reduction. In relation to the “Bryan Haulage” question: is the conduct such that the operator ought to be put out of business? The background to this operation is unattractive and current compliance largely non-existent but, by the finest of margins, I find that this is a business that can continue at a size that remains viable.

Mrs Mulholland was not called to consider her good repute as transport manager. She is also transport manager for her son’s business East Coast (Mids) Ltd, OH2002359. There will have been learning from the public inquiry process and from recent training. I am offered an undertaking for a full compliance systems audit which I accept. I will request the same undertaking from her son. If that is given and both audits are substantially clear of concerns, Mrs Mulholland can consider herself extremely fortunate. If there are any significant concerns, she is on notice that she will be called again to a public inquiry to consider her continuing ability to use her professional qualification. That is the clearest of warnings I can give her.

5. DECISION

Mulholland Tippers Ltd has failed to establish its good repute. The application is refused.

Pursuant to a finding under Section 26(1)(f), Mulholland International Limited is curtailed to three vehicles and zero trailers immediately and indefinitely.

The following undertaking is recorded in relation to Mulholland International Limited:

An audit shall be conducted by a competent independent person by 31 May 2021. The scope of the audit shall include systems for the management of maintenance, driver licencing, drivers hours and working time and the role of the transport manager in line with the requirements of EU Regulation 1071/2009 and STC Guidance. The audit report will be prepared, acted upon and retained for at least 2 years. A copy of the report together with the operator’s plans for implementing any recommendations will be forwarded to the Office of the Traffic Commissioner by 30 June 2021.

The same undertaking is to be requested of OH2002359

Kevin Rooney

Traffic Commissioner

12 February 2021