Lord-Castle v Director of Public Prosecutions

A vehicle is used for ambulance purposes if it is used, or primarily used, for conveying sick, injured or disabled persons. The vehicle need not itself satisfy a technical definition of an ambulance. Whether the exemption applies is a question of fact and degree. Relevant considerations may include actual carriage, the vehicle’s construction or adaptation, its past use, its medical equipment and the expertise of its personnel. None is necessarily decisive. First-aid assistance at an accident scene, without conveying casualties, does not by itself satisfy the test.

The appellant was convicted at Aldershot Magistrates’ Court of using a motor vehicle fitted with a siren, contrary to regulation 37(4) of the Road Vehicles (Construction and Use Regulations) 1986. He relied on the exception in regulation 37(5) for vehicles used for ambulance purposes. He was acquitted of a separate charge concerning a blue warning beacon.

By case stated, the Divisional Court considered whether the magistrates applied the correct legal test, whether there was a case to answer, whether an adverse inference could be drawn from the appellant’s failure to give evidence, whether evidential findings were open to the magistrates, and whether the costs order was lawful.

1. Appeal dismissed. The magistrates had applied an erroneous definition of a vehicle used for ambulance purposes, but the error did not affect the result.
2. Regulations 37(4) and 37(5) of the Road Vehicles (Construction and Use Regulations) 1986 do not require the vehicle to be an ambulance in a technical sense. The question is whether it is used, or primarily used, for conveying sick, injured or disabled persons. The definitions in regulation 3 of the 1986 Regulations and the Road Vehicles Lighting Regulations 1989 supported that interpretation.
3. The issue is one of fact and degree. Relevant factors include whether the vehicle was carrying a casualty, its capacity for carrying sick or injured persons, its actual past use, its medical equipment, and the expertise of those using it. Those factors are not exhaustive and none is necessarily determinative. The mere fact that a vehicle could transport somebody to hospital is insufficient. Assistance at an accident scene pending the arrival of emergency services does not, without more, amount to use for ambulance purposes.
4. The prosecution evidence established a case to answer. The vehicle was being used as a private car, was not adapted to carry a casualty on a stretcher, lacked significant medical equipment, and had not been used to transport a sick, injured or disabled person. The magistrates were therefore entitled to reject the submission of no case.
5. The magistrates were entitled under section 35 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 to draw an adverse inference from the appellant’s failure to give evidence. They correctly understood that such an inference could not alone, or substantially, establish guilt.
6. The factual findings concerning the defence witnesses, the vehicle’s equipment and the interview evidence disclosed no error of law and were not Wednesbury unreasonable. The costs order was also within the magistrates’ discretion.
7. Although the appeal failed, the appellant was awarded his costs in the Divisional Court because he succeeded on the principal legal issue concerning the meaning of vehicle used for ambulance purposes.

• Aldershot Magistrates’ Court: convicted the appellant of the siren charge on 1 February 2008 and acquitted him of the beacon charge.
• High Court (Queen’s Bench Division), Divisional Court: dismissed the appeal by case stated, while granting the appellant a defendant’s costs order.