JOBSWORTH JAMBOREE
SWINDON DRIVER FINED FOR NAPPING, COULD HAVE BEEN DEAD
A taxi driver has criti- cised traffic wardens who gave him a £50 ticket while he slept - claiming they should have first checked whether he was alive. Steve Woodwards, 41, pulled over for a nap in an empty short stay car park at 7am but nodded off before buying a ticket. When he woke up 20 min- utes later a traffic warden had stuck a £50 penalty notice on his windscreen. Mr Woodwards, from Swindon, admits he was illegally parked but says the warden should have checked he wasn’t dead behind the wheel. He told the Daily Tele- graph: “This person had no consideration
as to whether I was alive, I could have been in a coma or seri- ously ill.
“I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t have expect- ed to find a cab driver sleeping in a car park, so just a quick knock on the door to check if I was OK would have been nice. “We’d had a busy morning so I pulled into a space for a quick drink and just dozed off for about 20 minutes.
“It is not like the space was needed as there was only one other car in the car park. Just a bit of decency would- n’t have gone amiss.” Small print on the back of the ticket reveals that the war- den had to observe his
car for at least three minutes before issuing the ticket. Mr Woodwards said: “He [the traffic war- den] must have been completely silent because when you are just dozing, the slight- est noise can wake you up.
“I have a radio unit in the car which makes a bleeping noise to let me know I have a job to go to, and that always wakes me up. “This just shows these traffic wardens aren’t concerned about peo- ple’s welfare, all they are interested in is the money.” Mr Woodwards has agreed to pay the fine but described the traf- fic warden’s actions as “stupid”.
NO TAX TAXI BOSS ENRAGED BY ‘OVER ZEALOUS’ CHESHIRE POLICE
Taxi drivers’ leader and Fenland councillor Dave Patrick claims “over zealous and heavy handed” Ches- hire Police left him nursing a £100 bill. He claims their actions also forced him to make a 300 mile round trip to collect £160 which he had parted with on his journey north to buy a new minibus. Cllr Patrick paid £4,000 for the second hand minibus and was stopped just 15 min- utes later for driving it without a tax disc. “I’ve been a taxi driver for around 14 years and I would never do anything to jeopardise my livelihood,” he told the Wisbech Standard. “I have purchased vehi-
cles without tax before and just sorted the disc the next day. I was sim- ply going to do the same again and wasn’t aware I was committing an offence.” Cllr Patrick, chairman of the Wisbech and District Hackney Car- riage Drivers’ Asso- ciation, complained to the force after he forked out the £260 release fee to prevent Bowers Recovery tak- ing the minibus after police impounded it. Cllr Patrick had to return to Altrincham days later to collect a £160 refund he was entitled to from the fee. He said: “The police lacked understanding or any discretion. They said they had a duty to stop me as the vehicle
had been showing no tax for ages but it had been sitting in a show- room.
“It could have been easily sorted out by giving me seven days to produce my docu- ments.”
After taking four-year- old grandson Jamie along for the journey Mr Patrick was concerned the pair were going to be left stranded.
“The situation should have been better han- dled,” said Cllr Patrick. A spokesman for Cheshire Police said: “Officers acted lawful- ly and in line with DVLA procedures and guidelines in relation to the seizure of untaxed vehicles being driven on the public road.”
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0800 142 2815 PAGE 36 PHTM OCTOBER 2010
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