A haulage firm owner who was sentenced to three and a half years in prison for money laundering has been disqualified from running vehicles by the region’s Traffic Commissioner.
Gurbax Singh, who was jailed last month after using his alcohol wholesale business to trade in non-UK duty paid alcohol, is now banned from the industry for five years.
Nick Denton, the Traffic Commissioner for London and the South East of England, said Mr Singh’s imprisonment had left his business, UKK Wines Limited, “rudderless and wholly unable to fulfil its compliance responsibilities”.
He added: “It is entirely appropriate, in these circumstances, for the licence to be revoked.”
The Traffic Commissioner said that the order to disqualify Mr Singh for five years reflected the seriousness of the prison sentence and the fact that “his crime was bound up with the business of the operator and its vehicles.”
During a public inquiry on 14 June, Mr Denton heard evidence about the company’s vehicle operations. Investigators from the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) reported the company had:
– Allowed illegal operators to use its licence to continue running vehicles;
– 1364km of mileage missing from vehicle records;
– Drivers committing offences (failing to use tachograph chart or driver card);
– Failed to produce documentation, despite a legal duty to do so;
– Allowed vehicles to be parked at unauthorised sites
Mr Singh’s firm had previously appeared before the Traffic Commissioner at a public inquiry in 2013, when the licence was suspended for five days.
The regulator said the DVSA findings clearly showed that, quite apart from his involvement in criminal activities, Mr Singh had simply continued to exercise inadequate oversight over his licence and vehicles, with what appeared to be a large measure of complacency and neglect. A lengthy disqualification was appropriate.
