Free Traffic Legal Advice

I am trying to help a Family member who has been summoned to court regarding driving disqualification

Family member provides full time care and assistance for a family member who has mobility issues.

They used the family members vehicle to purchase food but they were stopped by the policy and the vehicle was seized because they were not on the insurance policy.


I am after advice on how best they can prepare for the court?

Do they need to bring anything with them to court?

Disqualification would be disastrous as it would be incredibly difficult to provide care, food, medication and assistance to immobile individual.

If it helps, the immobile individual has a Blue Badge, they receive Attendance Allowance and the family member is in receipt of Carer's Allowance.

Is it a motability vehicle ? If so even if there is DOV cover in place from the policyholders own policy it doesn't necessarily help because motability don't generally give permission for anybody who is not a named driver.

And is there any particular reason why the OP is providing a gibberish second hand account, concerning two parties both helpfully identified as "family member"?

You need to tell us exactly what has happened. Or better still, get the family member concerned to post themselves so that information does not get lost or distorted in the telling.

We need to know what they have been convicted of (presumably driving without insurance), what their previous offences were and when they took place, what the sentences were (particularly in terms of points or disqualification) for those offences.

The reason this is important is that you are talking about the person concerned making an "exceptional hardship" argument. This is only available when the driver faces a "totting up" disqualification. There is  lot more to presenting this argument than simply turning up with a letter from somebody who has a vested interest in seeing the driver remain on the road.
 

Quote from: Pringles on July 08, 2024, 04:24:26 pm

I also understand that given their circumstances of (i.e. being a full time carer) they could possibly ask for leniency on grounds of 'exceptional hardship'.

To go down this ground, would a letter from the care receiver be enough. Or would they need to provide additional documents such as proof of Attendance Allowance, bank statements etc

Would this need to be submitted in advance or could they just turn up to the hearing with their evidence?

Exceptional hardship is indeed the term, and that it is hardship to others carries more weight than hardship to the 'criminal'.

Anything to show that the hardship is genuine, they would probably be advised to take that evidence but only share it if questioned, they will be giving verbal evidence under oath (so no telling porkies) and usually a court won't ask for every element to be proven.  No need for a suite, just clean and relatively smart to show they are taking it seriously, we aren't in the 1980's anymore!

No need to present anything in advance, the court is aiming to achieve Justice so while they will want to ask some pertinent questions no-one will set out to trip them up on admin type issues.

Thank you.

This is precisely what I was after. Just some general advice I could pass on.

Suit is not required. Dress smart, but not over the top.

In case it is required, have evidence ready and in order.

Thanks again.