I've got a legal problem - can anyone help ?
As I understand things, a bona fida mechanic conducting a road test doesn't have to wear a seat belt providing that the vehicle being tested is displaying trade plates. I haven't used trade plates for years, but as far as I know the conditions of issue and use haven't changed since I last used them. All they do is allow (in limited circumstances) an untaxed vehicle to be used on a public road. Nothing else, and there are penalties for abuse.
I work as a mechanic for a van and truck rental company, my employer doesn't have any trade plates as we don't need them. Last week during a road test I was stopped for not wearing a seat belt. I tried to explain but the PC who stopped me was interested in nothing more than his £30 ticket and told me that if I wanted to argue with him it would have to be in court. Now it's occurred to me that if I had been using trade plates, I might have been contravening the terms and conditions of use as the van I was testing was road legal with no reason for trade plates to be displayed. I'd have been using them for a reason other than the one they were issued for. Would it be worth going to court and arguing this point? Also my name has been misspelt on the penalty notice - Poterson instead of Paterson, does this invalidate the ticket? Or should I just stump up@
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As you weren't using trade plates, why are you contemplating arguing the point IF you did have them you may have contravened their use?
IMHO, you weren't wearing a seat belt so were served with a ticket. The fact your name was spelt incorrectly doesn't alter the fact it was you.
Too many people abdicate responsibility over matters like these and yet complain if a 'real' criminal gets off on a technicality.
Pay up!
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Steve
Reg 6 (h) Motor Vehicles (Wearing of Seat Belts) Regs 1993 exempts a person riding in a vehicle being used under a trade licence for the purposes of investigating or remedying a mechanical fault.
Whilst you no doubt were doing exactly the same regretable that your journey was not under the exemption covered by the use of Trade licence and therefore not lawfulas far as seltbelt.
The fact that your name was incorrectly recorded opens another argument for Plod in that was the a an o?
It looks very much as if it is going to cost you but if you want to try you have 28 days to write in with the mitigating factors you mention but I doubt you will be successful.
As an employee will not your firm cough up?
DVD
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Also my name has been misspelt on the penalty notice - Poterson instead of Paterson, does this invalidate the ticket?
An incorrectly filled out penalty notice got me off of a £40 fine a few years ago. Plod put Tuesday 29th October 1994 instead of Tuesday 25th October 1994.
A polite letter sent with the cheque to the Clerk of the Justices indicating this error soon got the cheque returned with the words "CANCELLED" stamped across it in red. No further action was taken.
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Sorry to be facetious, but:
does using trade plates and/or testing a vehicle somehow make one immune to having an accident? Ever seen anyones face after its been hit at 20mph with a steering wheel or been through the screen?
This law is there to protect YOU during an accident and the rest of us from having to pay to put you back together. You broke the law - so pay up. And learn the lesson.
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This has me totally baffled.
Firstly:
Assuming that mechanics are allowed not to wear seatbelts it surely can't be to test suspect brakes at 70mph.
It surely must be akin to a milk float driver stopping and starting at low speed every few yards and climbing in and out.
Surely it must apply to a mechanic crawling along and stopping every few yards to look at tyre condition or to pop the bonnet, or maybe to his mate in the boot listening for a funny noise.
So what kind of road test was it and why did the nice policeman pull you?
Secondly:
Why weren't you wearing your belt, even if you wouldn't have been breaking the law if you had been using trade plates, which you weren't, and which would have been illegal anyway?
Thirdly:
I thought you were one of the safety/ the law is the law/ you're putting my life at risk with your selfish actions/ you knew you were breaking the law so don't whinge and take your punishment like a man/ don't try looking for loopholes to try to wriggle out through brigade?
Be interesting to know what the fatality figures would have been without the existing laws being enforced. Probably be higher. Would be interesting to know how many fatal accidents involved a driver not being able to control his vehicle for some reason. Every single one I should think.
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Bogush
Don't know the exact figures off pat, but seat belts are recognised in the automotive industry as one of the biggest leaps forward in car safety. Thousands of lives have been saved by them as well as thousands of faces that would have got well smashed in by the wheel or facia or windscreen. Think about it - why else do pilots and rally drivers wear those very excellent four point harnesses? Four point belts are now under development for standard cars.
The same is also true of airbags. Of course the press pick up on those lives lost due to airbag deployment, rather like the personal liberty brigade did about compulsory seat belt wearing. In the States last year airbags saved around 250 lives, but cost around 12 (4 children) all of whom were proven to have been too close to the bag when it went off and not wearing belts (at least 2 of the children had been sitting in a adults lap in the front!!!!!)
Of course the only way to be sure of not being killed or maimed in an accident is not to have an accident! If only....
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I still have a nasty feeling that the sense of safety that a seat belt gives to the driver can encourage irresponsible behaviour.
If the government had the courage to try it, it would be interesting to see what the result was of banning seat belts for a month!
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Some people really ARE exempt from wearing seat belts. A certain footballer, recently transferred for £30M+, was seen on the news driving his Ferrari convertible with no belt on and he wasn't on trade plates!
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It's not just the belts, Brian. It's the whole plethora of improved safety and performance features in the car as a whole that does it.
Personally I advocate a 6 inch spike sticking out the centre of the steering wheel!
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