Taxi Driver Online

Private Hire firm loses special school contract over defective tyre



A Private Hire firm has been stripped of a contract to take pupils to school after failing to address safety concerns raised five months ago.

Jimmy’s Private Hire, based in Hartshorne, had its Derbyshire County Council contract terminated with immediate effect after one of its vehicles was found to have a defective tyre.

In June, a tyre on a minibus used to take children from South Derbyshire to Stanton Vale Special School, in Long Eaton, was found to have a nail in it and the firm was told to repair the fault.

But in a spot check carried out on November 11, inspectors found the tyre was in an illegal condition — with the offending nail still in place.

A spokesman for the council said: “We cancelled a contract with a taxi company following an inspection of its vehicle at Stanton Vale Special School on November 11.

“The minibus was found with an illegal tyre which had a nail stuck in it. The same vehicle had been inspected earlier in the year and found to have a tyre that was close to being illegal and with a nail in it. At the time, we told the taxi company to fix the tyre.

“Following the inspection of vehicles on November 11 we were able to find another taxi company to take over this contract on the same day.

“We take the safety of all those children who need taxis to get to school very seriously and this is why we regularly inspect the vehicles used.

“If we find taxi companies using unsafe vehicles, we take immediate action to terminate their contracts, although thankfully this is rare.”

Jimmy’s was last in the news in January when a minibus driven by its owner, Jimmy Fitzpatrick, on the same school run, was involved in a fatal collision in heavy snow on the A514 near Swarkestone Bridge.

A passenger in the vehicle, Ruth Ramsell, from Midway, was critically injured and lost her battle for life at Royal Derby Hospital five weeks after the collision.

Mr Fitzpatrick declined the Mail’s request for a comment.

source: http://www.burtonmail.co.uk/News/Taxi-firm-loses-special-school-contract-over-defective-tyre-22112011.htm

accident story; http://www.burtonmail.co.uk/News/School-run-cabbie-is-critical.htm

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Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.
George Carlin

You can't believe some people. He even got a warning about the tyre. What an idiot, I hope the council take away his operators license.
We had a driver in our town who refused to take a car out because the tyres were below the legal limit. The owner told him to take it down to the tyre garage and replace the worst one after he had done his school run. He went down to the tyre place and it turned out that all 4 tyres were illegal so he changed the lot. Boy did the owner go up the wall. I go up the wall if tyres are left until they are close to the limit. I would rather get them changed early, particulaly at this time of year when roads can be slippy.

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Grandad,

The mind boggles !!! there used to be one round here like that who would only put retreads on and only after a lot of pestering from the drivers at the end of the day if you get a puncture or a blow out whilst POB the repercussions could be severe safety first !

It wasn't Mark Eldred was it ? he used to work for the one round here that was like that

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

No it wasn't Mark. He runs his own vehicle now. Mind you he has had a few problems with his cars this year.

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Grandad,

The current thing here is "Second User" Tyres.

I gather that Germany has deeper, Minimum Tread, Legislation and these Second User Tyres are now being heavily promoted by a couple of Specialist Companies.

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Don't dream it ~ Be it.

There's one firm round here who will run on a space saver all weekend instead of getting it changes for a new tyre.

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Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience.

Believe me, don't get Mercury X2

But was it the same tyre ? Could it have been replaced and also got a nail in it ? As for the safety, it's lasted at least five months without any problems !

I'm joking of course, any safety issue should be rectified ASAP once you become aware of it. Saying that I drove with a nail in the tyre for god knows how long, didn't know until the tyre got changed (low tread), no 'clicking' sound, slow puncture or anything.

Are you saying that apart from checking the tread, you never check your tyres?

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Grandad,

I check my tyres every single day Well I check they're all still on my vehicle Seriously tho I take mine every week to the tyre place so they can check them

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Note to self: Just because it pops into my head does NOT mean it should come out of my mouth!!

The tyre place?

technical huh.

CC

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Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.
George Carlin

Well what would you call it?

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Note to self: Just because it pops into my head does NOT mean it should come out of my mouth!!

He hasn't been driving them into flooded rivers again has he ?

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

Is there something I should know?

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Grandad,

Many years ago now but he decided to go the back road between ketton and collyweston which is a notorious flood spot when we had had heavy rain as you know mark tends to be heavy footed and couldn't stop in time so car ended up on my parents drive trying to get all the water out. i think the insurance did stump up for water damage

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lack of modern legislation is the iceberg sinking the titanic of the transport sector

Thanks for that, roll on Friday evening.

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Grandad,