Exceptional Hardship Success at Milton Keynes Magistrates’ Court

This case study explains how we, at Kang & Co Solicitors, helped a client we will call Dale (not his real name, which has been changed to protect his identity) avoid a totting up driving disqualification by successfully arguing exceptional hardship at Milton Keynes Magistrates’ Court. Dale is a secondary school teacher employed at an academy school in Milton Keynes and lives in Northampton with his wife and two young children. Facing his third speeding offence in three years, and with it the prospect of reaching fifteen penalty points, well past the twelve point totting up threshold, Dale instructed us to prepare and present an exceptional hardship application on his behalf. The court accepted our submissions in full, and Dale kept his driving licence.

Reaching the Twelve Point Threshold

Dale already had nine penalty points on his licence from two earlier speeding matters, both dealt with by way of fixed penalty notices in the preceding two years. He was then stopped and reported for a further speeding offence on the A509 near Wellingborough, having been recorded travelling at 42mph in a 30mph limit. Under the Sentencing Council’s definitive guideline for speeding offences, a recorded speed of 41 to 50mph in a 30mph limit falls within Band B, which carries a starting point of four to six penalty points or, as an alternative, a short discretionary disqualification of between seven and twenty eight days. Given Dale’s existing points and previous speeding history, the magistrates imposed six penalty points, which took his total to fifteen within a three year period, comfortably past the twelve point threshold. Under section 35 of the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988, a court dealing with an offence that brings a driver’s total to twelve or more points within three years must impose a minimum six month disqualification, commonly known as a totting up ban, unless the driver can demonstrate exceptional hardship, or another form of mitigation the court considers appropriate, that justifies not disqualifying him or reducing the period of disqualification.

Instructing Kang & Co Solicitors

Dale had heard of exceptional hardship applications from a colleague at his school who had faced a similar situation, and he began researching specialist motoring defence solicitors shortly after receiving his postal requisition for the new speeding matter. He was conscious that an exceptional hardship application is not something to approach without proper legal advice, particularly given how much was at stake for his family. He instructed us to advise him and to represent him at the hearing listed at Milton Keynes Magistrates’ Court.

What the Law Requires

We explained to Dale that an exceptional hardship application is not simply an opportunity to describe general inconvenience. The word exceptional is doing real work in the statute. Ordinary hardship, such as loss of convenience or a longer commute, is expressly excluded from consideration under section 35 of the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988. The court’s focus is on the effect that a disqualification would have on people other than the driver himself, and whether that effect goes materially beyond what would ordinarily be expected when someone loses their licence. We advised Dale that a strong application needed to be built around clearly evidenced, specific consequences for his dependants, rather than a broad account of how difficult life would become for him personally.

Understanding Dale’s Circumstances

We held a detailed conference with Dale to understand exactly how his family life and employment depended on his ability to drive. Dale and his wife live in Northampton, roughly eighteen miles from the school in Milton Keynes where he works. His role requires him to be on site by 7.45am for a compulsory staff briefing and pastoral duties, and he often stays late to run an after school revision club. We reviewed the available public transport options in detail and found that the only realistic route, a train from Northampton to Milton Keynes Central followed by a connecting bus, could not reliably get him to school before 8.20am even on a good day, and offered no realistic means of getting home at the times his after school commitments required.

We also learned that Dale’s youngest daughter, aged seven, has type 1 diabetes, diagnosed some eighteen months earlier. Dale is the parent primarily responsible for her morning routine, including checking her blood glucose levels and administering her insulin before school, and for collecting her promptly from an after school club that is not equipped to manage her condition beyond a short window each afternoon. Dale’s wife works as a paramedic, with a rotating shift pattern that regularly includes nights and early starts, and her hours could not be relied upon to consistently cover their daughter’s care. In addition, Dale’s mother, who lives locally and suffers from Parkinson’s disease, depends on Dale for transport to and from regular hospital appointments in Northampton, as she is no longer able to drive herself and struggles with public transport due to her mobility.

Building the Grounds for Exceptional Hardship

Having identified the family’s genuine circumstances, we advised Dale on which grounds were strong enough to properly support an exceptional hardship application, and which points, however genuinely felt, were unlikely to carry real weight with the court. We did not rely on Dale’s own commute as a standalone ground, since inconvenience to the driver alone is not what section 35 is concerned with. Instead, we built the application around the risk to his daughter’s health and daily care, the effect on his mother’s access to essential medical treatment, and the practical impossibility of his wife reliably covering these responsibilities given her own shift pattern as a paramedic. We also addressed the likely loss of Dale’s employment, not as a point about his own convenience, but because the family’s finances, and in turn his children’s welfare, depended heavily on his income, particularly given the unpredictable nature of his wife’s shift based earnings.

Gathering the Evidence

We advised Dale on the precise evidence needed to support each ground before the hearing. This included a letter from his daughter’s paediatric diabetes nurse specialist confirming her diagnosis and the nature of the daily care she requires, a letter from his mother’s neurology consultant confirming her diagnosis and ongoing appointment schedule, and a letter from Dale’s headteacher confirming his contracted hours, his pastoral responsibilities, and the practical difficulty the school would face in accommodating a six month period without reliable transport. We also prepared printed public transport journey planner results demonstrating, clearly and objectively, why the available train and bus service could not meet the demands of his working day. We reviewed each document with Dale in advance to ensure it was accurate, relevant and properly focused on the grounds we intended to advance.

The Hearing at Milton Keynes Magistrates’ Court

Dale’s case was heard at Milton Keynes Magistrates’ Court. We represented him at the hearing and presented the exceptional hardship application in a clear and structured manner, taking the magistrates through each ground in turn and referring them to the supporting evidence at each stage. We were careful to keep the focus firmly on the effect a disqualification would have on Dale’s daughter and mother, rather than on Dale’s own circumstances, consistent with the correct legal test. Dale gave evidence himself, answering questions from the bench about his daughter’s care routine and his mother’s appointments, which he did clearly and consistently, reinforcing the evidence already before the court.

The Outcome

The magistrates accepted that a six month disqualification would cause exceptional hardship in this case, principally because of the risk to Dale’s daughter’s daily diabetes management and his mother’s access to ongoing medical treatment, for which no reliable alternative existed. His licence was endorsed with the further six penalty points, taking his total to fifteen, and he received a fine for the speeding offence itself, but the court did not impose a disqualification. Dale kept his licence, and with it, the ability to continue caring for his daughter and his mother, and to remain in his teaching post without interruption.