Fine for farm worker who injured cyclist due to dangerous load

There is so, so much wrong with this but it sums up how useless the legal system is. I hope the cyclist recovers well.

 “The defendant followed the cyclist as he moved up the hill although it appears the cyclist was not moving at the speed Mr Dunn-Fawell anticipated."

Following the crash, the driver was said to have told the cyclist repeatedly “I didn’t see you.”

So which was it

Cotton batting sentence from a crazy judge, I'd say.

20 year old, inexperienced driver.
"Serious injury" is GBH level - it starts with broken bones.
Apparently did not even try and look. Either he loaded up his vehicle so he could not see out of it, or he was looking somewhere else if he could have seen - so that's at least medium culpability
Drove straight into a cyclist from behind.

Multiple aggrravating factors - commercial vehicle, vulnerable road user, Certain mitigatinbg factors.

Judge had, I think, the option of imposing a short ban and an extended retest, which would have made the driver a little less dangerous.

The driver is incredidbly lucky - sentencing guidelines for this offence have just been tightened.

One ton bags aren't going to move about much when being carried on a public highway, if at all. Therefore, one can only assume the driver of the telehandler was far too close to the cyclist in the first place.

It would be interesting to know if the defendant actually holds a licence for driving a telehandler, there is no mention of it in the report. When I used to drive a telehandler on construction projects, not only did you need a licence to prove your competency in driving the vehicle, but also a further licence, for under-slung goods when driving with materials effectively dangling from the forks.

Unfortunately, this is the problem with going in front of a magistrate, rather than to Crown Court, you are left in the hands of a well meaning individual who has no experience whatsoever in the circumstances that they are basing their judgements on and who will pass judgement from the meagre evidence put before them.

If something like this had happened on a farm I suspect that the HSE would have been all over it. In industrial settings there's a responsibility on the employer to ensure staff are competent and forklift operators are regularly retested. More importantly you would need specific qualifications for a telehandler. Why does this responsibility for health and safety seem to end when the same employee is on a public highway.

"TEESSIDE"!

"You never intended to do it" and you didn't see him. Never fails!!

"Judge Crowson said the defendant has driven in an "unblemished way" the last three years and demonstrated he is careful driver. "

Well that was fortunate! What if they hadn't?! It's taken 3 years to bring this driver before the courts.

Driving a telehandler with 2x one tonne bags swinging around blocking your view of the road sounds lethal. Surely a telehandler should only be used to load items onto a lorry/trailer, not for transporting goods on public roads.