A TREE surgeon escaped a driving ban despite being in charge of a car while under the influence of cocaine and cannabis after a magistrate told him he could not cycle to work.

Matthew Haines, aged 25, of Lenchwick, near Evesham, admitted being in charge of a car while above the limit for the breakdown substances of both cocaine and cannabis when he appeared before magistrates in Worcester on Thursday.

Police approached him in a Ford pickup on the A46 in Evesham on July 1 where he tested positive for drugs.

But the bench of three magistrates opted to impose 10 penalty points, allowing to keep his licence rather, rather than ban him after his solicitor said being in charge of a car under the influence of drugs was not the same as being in charge of a car under the influence of drink.

Tony Fussey, chairman of the bench, said: “It’s not easy to be a tree surgeon on a bike.”

Tests showed Haines had 3.6 micrograms of Delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol per litre of blood (the limit being 2 micrograms) and 96 micrograms of Benzoylecgonine per litre of blood (the limit being 50 micrograms). These are the breakdown substances of cannabis and cocaine respectively.

Kamar Uddin, prosecuting, said Haines was in a service station car park when approached by police, sitting in the driver’s side of the pickup. Mr Uddin said: “When a police officer approached him he could smell cannabis. The keys were in the ignition and the defendant was the sole occupant.”

Chris Hilton, defending, said Haines had entered a timely guilty plea and should be given maximum credit and was fully co-operative with the police.

He said Haines was not alone and a friend was also with him. Haines tested positive for drugs when his friend did not.

Mr Hilton said: “There are no sentencing guidelines for an offence of this nature.

“It’s not uncommon for you to look at the equivalent in relation to being under the influence of alcohol while in charge of a vehicle.

“What I should say to you however is that you can’t do an exact correlation with alcohol when it comes to drugs.

“It might be that someone is 30 to 40 times (the drug limit) but if you were 30 to 40 times the limit for alcohol you would be dead.”

Mr Hilton stressed both readings were low and the offences fall ‘squarely in the lowest band’ for sentencing.

He said Haines was a self-employed tree surgeon who worked across Worcestershire and Warwickshire.

Magistrates fined him £150 for each of the offences, ordered him to pay £125 costs and a victim surcharge of £30.