In a previous article we reviewed the consultation process relating to the latest proposed amendments to the Senior Traffic Commissioner’s Statutory Guidance Document relating to vocational drivers. Doing so reminded us of the value of these Statutory Guidance Documents (‘the Stat Docs’) and the importance to operators, nominated transport managers and other professionals – including vocational drivers – involved in the operation and driving of large commercial vehicles (whether HGV or PSV) of being aware of their existence and far more usefully knowing of their actual content.
Emphasising the importance of the Stat Docs the Senior Traffic Commissioner made reference to them towards the beginning of his valedictory forward to the Traffic Commissioners for Great Britain : Annual Report to the Secretary of State 2024-2025 in which he said –
As the “Guide to Judicial Conduct” explains, fair treatment does not mean treating everyone in the same way: it means treating people equally in comparable situations. When parties do not get the outcome they would like or expect, it is particularly important that they feel they were fairly treated, fully heard and fully understood. It is with that aim in mind that I have continued to maintain the statutory guidance and statutory directions and to professionalise the jurisdiction. It is of some relief to finally see that reflected in consolidated reference material for OTC staff, for which I have worked so hard.
So, the approach is not to treat operators as children. We recognise the complicated nature of transport businesses but also that those undertakings accept the basic obligations of an operator’s licence or as a transport manager when the application is made. GB’s achievements in road safety are underpinned by those obligations. Where there is evidence of non-compliance Traffic Commissioners provide a specialist tribunal which balances the interests of the party, against protecting the public and wider industry from unfair practices.
The Annual Report itself begins with a section entitled ‘Our purpose’ which is followed by a list of the traffic commissioners’ functions which includes at the top of the list –
“Publishing guidance and directions regarding the operator licensing regime and tribunal activities.”
There are two reasons why operators and nominated transport managers should ensure that they are familiar with the Stat Docs: firstly, they are expected to be aware of them by the Traffic Commissioners before whom they may be required to appear, and secondly they are a legal mine of useful information that is regularly updated to reflect developments in the law which are directly relevant to the industry and the way in which it is regulated. To quote the famous American jurist, Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, “the law is nothing more than a prediction of what judges will in fact do”.
Having an understanding of the ways in which traffic commissioners expect operators and nominated transport managers to conduct themselves and their professional business enables them to view the way in which they operate their commercial vehicles from the perspective of those to whom they may one day need to answer in person. The operator’s licensing regime relies on trust. Having a meaningful insight into what this actually means makes it less likely – not more so – that one will ever have to face a traffic commissioner in a public inquiry.
The 15 Stat Docs are listed in below, and the latest editions can be sourced here
0. Introduction to operator licensing, the statutory guidance and statutory direction
- Good Repute & Fitness
- Finance
- Transport Managers
- Operating centres, stable establishments & address for service
- Legal Entities
- Vocational Driver Conduct
- Impounding
- Delegation of Authority
- Case Management
- The principles of decision making and the concept of proportionality
- Format of Decisions
- Appeals
- PSV Operations including small vehicles, limousines and novelty vehicles
- Local bus services in England (outside London) and Wales
When would-be operators apply for their operator’s licences they are required to sign and date the application. When doing so they are required to confirm that the information contained in the application is true and they are required to promise to comply with a list of undertakings designed to ensure that lawful and safe operation of any vehicles that are operated under the operator’s licence should it be granted. A failure to sign the application will result in the application being refused; not simply because the applicant has ‘forgotten to sign the form’ but because the applicant has failed to make the necessary promises of future compliance, without which no traffic commissioner will be willing to grant the licence. The promises of future compliance – and the trust relied upon by the traffic commissioners that the promises will be kept – are the foundations upon which operator’s licences are granted.
It is trite, but nevertheless fundamental, to observe that for these promises of future compliance to be meaningful applicants must actually know what it is that they are promising. So by way of example a promise to ensure that the drivers’ hours and record keeping rules will be complied with, requires that whomever makes this promise actually knows which rules apply (EU retained legislation and / or UK domestic) to which aspects of their operation, and applicants must know what records are required to be held (drivers’ hours and where applicable road transport working time) and for how long those records are required to be kept.
Put another way, how can one promise to comply with rules about which one is unaware? It calls to mind former US Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld’s much quoted observation that “There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don't know we don't know.”
In so far as the Stat Docs are concerned, the challenge for transport professionals will be to find the time to make sense of them and thereafter stay up to date with the development of these documents over time. Advice in articles such as this one to ‘read them’ is likely to be as unhelpful as it is on point!
The Stat Docs can be divided into two broad categories. Stat Docs in the first category are concerned with the essentials of operator licensing, in particular : Stat Docs 0-6, (as well as 13 & 14 for PSV operators). Stat Docs in the second category are concerned with the way in which the functions of the office of the traffic commissioner are conducted, especially in relation to public inquiries, for which see Stat Docs 7-12.
Whenever one needs to consult a Stat Doc the government website is a good starting point – saving the PDF for a particular Stat Doc to your computer system so that you can refer to it in future can be helpful, but it is important to make sure that you are referring to the most up to date edition; see for example Stat Doc 3 – Transport Managers which was published in March 2025 and is currently at Version 17 (and as an aside, see paragraph 24 which starts by stating “Continuous and effective responsibility means just that. An applicant or operator can be taken to be aware of the various guidance documents issued on behalf of the Senior Traffic Commissioner”).
As appeal cases are issued and as the law changes which it does over time, the Stat Docs are designed to keep pace, calling to mind a different eminent jurist and senior judge, Lord Denning, who stated “If we never do anything which has not been done before, we shall never get anywhere. The law will stand still whilst the rest of the world goes on; and that will be bad for both.”
The fundamentals of an effective compliance regime are simple (but not easy). Know the law and understand its purpose. Have systems in place that enable you to achieve compliance. Record the operation of the systems. Make certain to check that the systems remain effective. Record the checks. It is no accident that ‘know the law and understand its purpose’ comes first and the Stat Docs provide a valuable framework within which to understand what is expected.
Taken together the Stat Docs run to many hundreds of pages, and an expectation that operators and transport managers are taken to know the content is not the same as expecting that all the information contained in them must be memorised. The road transport regime is a practical jurisdiction. Its practitioners must operate in the real world – a world in which there are many operational and commercial challenges which involve many competing pressures on one’s time every day. So a balance must be struck.
What works well as a starting point is to produce a table similar to the one above, but with a final column entitled ‘date reviewed’. Diarise to look at 1 or 2 Stat Docs each calendar month. Allocate 15 minutes for each review. For the review itself start with a ‘page turn’ on screen. Scroll through the document page by page at a speed that enables you to ‘review’ the whole of the Stat Doc in no more than 5 minutes. As you go, make a note of any topics that catch your eye. Use the remaining 10 minutes to go back to the topics that you have identified and spend a little time reading into them. It may well be that from time to time a topic will justify further study and if it does then further time should be allocated. Over time the cumulative benefit of reviewing and then returning to the Stat Docs will likely be of genuine benefit (certainly enough to justify the time spent engaged in these regular reviews). This approach does not offer a miracle cure – and the same approach will work well when keeping up to date with the DVSA’s Guide to Maintaining Roadworthiness or relevant health & safety publications – but following it enables operators, transport managers and HGV & PSV drivers to take advantage of a resource that has been years in the making, is made available free of charge and with which they are expected to be familiar in any event.
As always if you would like to discuss this aspect of transport and regulatory law, or if there is another issue that your transport operation is facing then please call now on 01279 818280 or click here to send us an email. We are here to help.
© Richard Pelly November 2025
Article first appeared in Essential Fleet Management Magazine.
by Emma Pelly
