roythebus wrote:
So we have a woman with panic attacks driving a taxi and a lorry driving partner with limited thinking skills driving a lorry..wtf.. but then I suppose it's the norm for a lot in driving professions. I certainly wouldn't want to employ a bus driver who's had convictions for fraud and dishonesty, whether or not the Traffic Commissioner would have the same reservations remains to be seen.
Have the courts not heard of the Proceeds of Crime Act? Take one of his properties and sell it to reclaim the falsely claimed benefits!
I think the panic attack bit have been overstated somewhat in an effort to get some sympathy, the same with the limited thinking skills. I have known this woman for the last 4 years and I can't say that I noticed any sort of panic problems until last week when I accompanied her to a licensing sub committee hearing in regard to her taxi license. She was in a bit of a panic then but I think this was more due to the fact that she was in deep poo poo and couldn't get out of it.
From what I understand the houses were all bought on buy to let mortgages when the market was good and rented out. The tenants were less than reliable and the rent wasn't being paid although the tenants were getting housing benefits. Then the housing bubble burst and they were left with the houses in negative equity so they couldn't sell them which meant that they had huge monthly outgoings and little income from the rent. Now at this point what they should have done, in my opinion, was realise that it wasn't working and taken the hit and gone bankrupt. However, it seems that they listened to some people who "advised" them to go down the benefit route as a short term answer to the cash flow problem but as we know now, the market slump was deeper and longer than was expected so they had dug a hole and the sides were caving in around them. Reality started to hit 4 years ago when they were told that they were being investigated. This was when she applied for her taxi badge. This was brought up at the licensing meeting last week because one of the questions on the form asked if any investigation was ongoing and she ticked the box say "no" which meant that she had lied on her application form and the council don't like that sort of thing do they.
I think the main reason that they are both doing time now and not on suspended sentences is simply because right up until the end of the trial they would not accept the inevitable and still thought they could talk their way out of it. had they both just come clean 4 years ago and admitted everything the courts may have been more lenient.
I feel particularly let down by her because it was me who gave her a job and the first I heard about it was when my son rang me whilst I was on holiday in Spain and told me about the court case. The trial was during the last week of term and she didn't even tell me about it then. Her husband rang me after the school run on the Monday morning and told me she was very ill and had been rushed to hospital. I rang him on the Tuesday evening to see how she was and he just told me that she couldn't drive for the rest of the week because she was on strong pain killers because of her "illness". They have still been lying to the courts though by claiming that they weren't married when in fact they got married in Vegas a few years ago. I think they got what they deserved in the end though.
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