Skull wrote:
So Paul, if he's been to a solicitor, then why the fu*k, are you on here spouting your shi*e? Oh and incidentally, it's the solicitor who applies for legal aid on his client's behalf but your pal already knows. He's getting legal without even going through the process. Well, that's a new one on me.

Don’t agree it’s “spouting shi*te” but I’ll try to explain for the hard of thinking.
Monday – incident happened. He called me asking if I knew anyone who’d been in the same situ.
Tuesday – he arranges to see a solicitor.
Wednesday – he sees the solicitor. Gets advice and told he’ll more than likely get legal aid if the Fiscal presses it. He’ll get it because of his income – nothing to do with alleged road traffic act violations.
Thursday (today) – going to speak to Cab Inspector and CRT
Summary: you’re timing’s all askew (perhaps your mind’s being clouded by anger and assumption).
Regardless of what you think of the quality or merit of my coming on here and posting can’t you accept there’s a legitimate concern at play? That raises two points – a) if it’s happened to this guy it could happen to me, so there’s a lesson for all taxi or PH drivers to learn from.
b) This is a forum for guys who drive cabs or PH, so it seems logical to ask those people if they have encountered such a situation before and, if so, how they dealt with it and what the outcome was. Simples!
Skull wrote:
Paul, I think this is all bullshit. You come on to a forum, asking for advice when your chum has already been to a solicitor and arranged legal aid to fight his case. Surely, if there is, no case to answer, the charges would simply be dropped, with the owner finding himself in the dock, facing the conviction.

Oh and didn't you say something about him taking the problem up with the Cab Inspector?
He's been a busy boy in the last 24hours.

Think what you like, bud. You clearly can’t follow a timeline. Just to clarify: I came on here asking for advice BEFORE he’d spoken to anyone. It doesn’t matter what the solicitor subsequently might have indicated over the likelihood of there being a case to answer or not – that decision lies solely with the Procurator Fiscal. Whether the owner finds himself in the dock or not is a matter for the police and Fiscal going forward, not the driver or me for that matter.
Summary: you’re thinking’s all wrong (perhaps your mind’s being clouded by anger and assumption and an inability to work out a simple timeline).
Skull wrote:
Now let's think about this, if the new owner failed to pay the insurance, he would have to know the taxi was without insurance beyond a certain date. And if the plate holder failed to pay the insurance on the owner's behalf, both would have to know when the insurance would expire.
Would you leave the above to chance, if you were the owner or the plate holder knowing you would be found out?
So why isn't anyone coming forward to take responsibility for the driver?
Surely, it's a simple case of, “don't worry it was my fault, and I'm one to blame, and I will take responsibility.”
Problem solved.

I don’t know for a fact what the insurance payment arrangements were but from the driver I understand the new owner was paying the former owner payments to cover the premiums. I also understand that the former owner ceased the payment of the premiums on the mistaken understanding that the change of ownership was complete. In my opinion he should have at a minimum called the new owner to confirm but apparently this didn’t happen and the new owner was none the wiser that that the premiums had been stopped. You’re right to wonder why a new owner would leave himself open to such a own goal. But as I say, I don’t know the facts of it and am only going on what I understand to be the situation based on the info I’ve been told.
Maybe someone will come forward and hold their hand up, but that remains to be seen and I hope your right and they do.
I’ll say again – if you haven’t got anything helpful to say then just don’t get involved. You’re only showing yourself up to be an ignoramus by spouting off apparent ‘facts’ when you know neither me, the driver concerned or the true circumstances. You just comes across as the type of guy who believes he’ll get his point across by shouting over everyone. I’m struggling to fathom why you’re getting so involved if you’re so dismissive of the whole thing. I’m also struggling with why you’ve spent almost an hour obsessing over it again over three separate posts in the early hours of the morning. Baffling.
As regards being locked out the CRT system if no insurance is in place – yes, that is the case. In this case, the driver told me he’d informed the new owner when the reminder message was at 23 days to expiry and had written another reminder on the chucky envelope he gives the new owner each week when he dropped it off last week. At the point of being told there was no insurance the message that morning had informed the driver he had nine days to expiry.