Senior Associate
Clare is a Senior Associate in the Regulatory team.
Clare has particular expertise in helping clients with regulatory road transport issues.
She advises hauliers and businesses who operate their own heavy goods vehicles (whether as a specialist haulier, or as an ancillary part of a client’s business, moving their ‘own goods’), on matters relating to their operator's licences and provides representation and advice on public inquiries before the Traffic Commissioner, and on appeal to the Upper Tribunal. Clare takes a practical, frank and commercial approach to advising her clients.
She also advises businesses running minibuses, vans, buses and coaches and focusses on taking a strategic and commercial approach with clients to help them understand and meet their regulatory obligations (including drivers’ hours / working time, vehicle condition and maintenance, loading and driver’s licensing).
Clare is experienced in helping clients with an ancillary interest in the regulatory requirements of tenants / third parties, including as part of corporate due-diligence and planning for major developments.
Her clients include a defence organisation, food supplier, steel stockholder, white goods distributors, property developers, visitor attraction businesses and packaging manufacturers.
Recent examples of how Clare has supported clients include:
- advising an operator whose vehicle was involved in a bridge strike, helping them to put more robust systems and processes in place in advance of a Public Inquiry before the Traffic Commissioner. As a result, the company was given only a formal warning (the more severe alternatives to this being revocation, suspension or curtailment of their licence), and the Traffic Commissioner praised the work undertaken to rectify the company's issues;
- advising a steel stockholder about an overloaded vehicle, and the work to be done in order to improve the chances of avoiding a possible criminal prosecution and likely subsequent Public Inquiry;
- advising a global organisation as to whether they need an operator’s licence (considering their use of various vehicle and trailer combinations), the regulatory requirements surrounding that, and in respect of strategic considerations for cross-jurisdictional operations.
- providing strategic risk management advice to various operators (with and without operator’s licences) in dealing with the handling of matters including: drivers’ hours offences; overloaded vehicles; MOT failures; vehicle maintenance issues; and appropriate driving licences.