A Romanian transport manager that turned up to a public inquiry from the airport without quarantining has been criticised by the traffic commissioner.
TC Richard Turfitt was forced to cancel a Cambridge PI after hearing that the director of RBT Logistics, Florin Stoica, had driven proposed transport manager Florin Pop to the tribunal on the day he arrived from Romania. The operator sought a standard international licence for three vehicles and three trailers in Stanford Le Hope, but due to the failure by Stoica to inform the office of the TC that his previous business, Maya Logistics, had become insolvent he was called to attend a PI to discuss his new business.
In a written decision, the TC said it was only due to the “quick thinking” of the operator’s solicitor, Michelle O’Garro, who alerted his office that Pop had just arrived from Romania and should have been quarantining himself under Covid-19 rules, that prevented the potential spread of the disease.
Turfitt said: “Having failed to quarantine, they caused potential risk to other members of the public and potentially to the legal representative and members of the tribunal staff.”
During the rescheduled PI, it became apparent that the operator lacked the financial standing to operate three vehicles and so it was revised down to one HGV instead. The TC expressed concerns about how continuous and effective management would be achieved, but he granted authority for three months, “by which time the applicant must satisfy me to the civil standard of proof that the statutory criteria are met,” he added.
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