This week the BBC news broke the story of the M1 fatal minibus crash “laid bare the loophole” where employers are not automatically told of drivers losing their licence.
Eight minibus occupants were killed in the crash in August caused by two lorry drivers – one of whom had lost their HGV licence 37 days earlier.
I don’t know about you, but hearing that one of those drivers had lost their licence and this could have been avoided is chilling.
Surely this has to happen as quickly as possible in order to get banned drivers off the roads? They have been banned for a reason right?
Steve you’re spot on – we should be getting this information the day after the courts update the DVLA.
Kevin
yes this should happen its only a good thing.
Agreed.
Too much resource goes into repeat licence checks when the vast majority of checks come back as low risk. A simple registration fee with DVLA should pay for the push service, which could be automated and withdrawn/cancelled (when a driver no longer drives/works for the employer).
Paul, you’re right – if we have to move to monthly checks it’s a big waste of resource. If we could simple check an ‘updated’ flag on the database then a licence check would only EVER need to be checked when a changed was detected. This would save a huge amount of money all round.
Kevin
Most certainly the licenses should be updated automatically, we in this industry could be driving around with somebody that’s been reckless, drunk in charge of a vehicle all to easy
Paul I agree – this is a road safety issue that needs to be addressed.
Kevin
I do not feel that there is even a debate in this. At the level of licence we are looking at here there is a significant risk to life, business and many other things. The DVSA have been slow with their updates to technology but are catching up. Where it relates to someone’s job there really should be a duty of care to inform the employers and the system is in place for the driver to okay this. The cost would be minimal as it would only be an email that would flag as urgent priority. In this there really should be a link in to health issues from GP’s and hospitals too.
Stuart I agree – we should be getting this information the day after the courts update the DVLA.
Kevin
Police can check the DVLA computer so why is it that employees do not have axes to in,
or all drivers that have lost their license should be put on a list the same day as the court
sets the baned to a central web page that employes can axes.
Agreed Mick – this needs to improve.
Kevin
I covered a company last year where the driving licence was 7.5 years out of date, worst to come he had been given 6 points onto his licence without a check that his licence was valid. This also needs to be tidied up as well.
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