[2024] UKUT 148 (AAC)

We shall deal first with the Appellant’s argument that the Traffic Commissioner made a flawed determination that his proposed PSV business would amount to his main occupation (so that, under section 13(3)(b) of the 1981 Act, a restricted licence would not authorise the Appellant’s use of a vehicle adapted to carry between nine and sixteen passengers).

The Commissioner used the proportion of the Appellant’s anticipated income attributable to the proposed PSV business as a proxy for his main occupation. Anticipated PSV income would, on the information provided by the Appellant, provide the majority of the Appellant’s annual income and so the Commissioner reasoned that the proposed PSV business would be the Appellant’s main occupation. That did not involve any misdirection in law. In fact, on those figures, it is difficult to see how the Commissioner could properly have arrived at any other conclusion.

The Appellant also criticises the Commissioner’s findings as to the proportion of the Appellant’s income that would be derived from the proposed PSV business. We are satisfied that, in making these findings, the Commissioner erred neither in fact nor law. The Commissioner was perfectly entitled take the information provided by the Appellant at face value and was not required to suggest how the Appellant might rearrange his work in order to satisfy the main occupation rule nor to speculate as to the Appellant’s likely income profile in the event that he started work as a qualified driving instructor. In any event, the Appellant’s own suggestion as to how he might rearrange his work, set out in his notice of appeal, would still leave the proposed PSV business as his main source of income (£8,000 per annum from interpreting; £5,000 from handyman work; £10,800 from the proposed PSV business).

The above conclusion makes it strictly unnecessary for us to consider whether the Commissioner unfairly refused to consider bank account evidence in the form of ‘screenshots’. However, we doubt that we would have allowed this appeal on that basis. We do not know enough about the screenshots provided by the Appellant to assess whether they amounted to the ‘internet statements’ referred to in the Senior Traffic Commissioner’s Statutory Document No.2. But even if they did, that Document provides, at paragraph 52, that “the traffic commissioner and staff acting on their behalf reserve the right to request originals”.

Finally, we apologise for the delay in giving this decision. Initially, due to an administrative oversight this case was not marked on the Upper Tribunal’s case management system as ready for decision. And, subsequently, the judge was absent from duties while recovering from injuries sustained in an accident.