A FORMER magistrate has been cleared of failing to give information to the police after a car was caught by a speed camera.

Contract cleaning company boss Kevin Ingham, 55, was found not guilty of the allegation by District Judge Paul Firth, after a trial at Burnley Magistrates Court.

Mr Ingham, of Holly House, Holden Road, Burnley, had denied the offence and told the court he could not honestly say who had been at the wheel of the vehicle at the time of the alleged offence.

The court had been told how the car was caught on camera doing 35mph on the 30mph Colne Road, last November.

Enquiries were made to trace the vehicle and the original owners said they had sold it.

Contact was then made with the defendant, the registered keeper, who responded, saying he was unable to say who had been driving.

Giving evidence, Mr Ingham told the court he had been contacted by police and asked to name the driver four and a half months after the offence. He had written back saying he couldn't, despite his "best endeavours."

He said the car, which he hired back to the company, was primarily used by himself but also by others. Work schedules saying who would have been driving were destroyed after a month as there was no need for them to be retained. He may have been able to say who the driver was before the end of December, but not months later in April.

Mr Ingham said the week of the offence, he had been moving from Bamford, Rochdale, to Burnley and it had been "absolute chaos."

He said either he or one of six other people -- his wife, his three children, or two supervisors from his firm, could have been driving the car. He had asked his family and two employees if they remembered going through a camera and the light flashing and they said they did not. Neither of his supervisors, who had been working on his house, had any points on their driving licences.

Mr Ingham told the hearing he could not honestly say who was driving at that particular time and went on: "I thought it was unreasonable to request that almost four and a half months after the event."