PASSENGERS who had a miracle escape after a drink-driver ploughed into their minibus have slammed his 12-month ban, saying it is too lenient.

David Jones was more than twice the alcohol limit when he hit a minibus full of racegoers from Barnoldswick, as they travelled home down the M6 on August 10.

The minibus plunged down an embankment near the motorway's junction with the M65 just after 10pm, and driver John Merry was hailed a hero after he managed to regain control and guide the bus away from a concrete gantry.

Jones, of St Mary's Street, Walton-le-Dale, admitted the charge at South Ribble Magistrates' Court and said he had lost his job and was unable to pay his mortgage.

He was fined £700 and banned for a year, although he could be on the road again within nine months if he takes a driver improvement course.

Bridgit Kearns, a process worker from Great Harwood, hurt her shoulder, back and was left with a black eye in the incident.

She said the sentence did not send out the right message to other drivers.

"I don't think it's enough but there's nothing you can do - I'm not a judge," she said.

"He should definitely have been given a longer sentence, we could all have been killed.

"I don't know whether a custodial sentence is the appropriate thing but this definitely feels too lenient."

Linda Costelloe, of bus company B&J Travel, said Jones had been a "very lucky man".

She said: "He has got off lightly all round, not just with the sentence.

"He could have been facing a manslaughter charge."

Passenger Jonathan Phillips, of Chestnut Drive, Barnoldswick, added: "It makes a mockery of the law especially as he has been given the chance to have the ban reduced by going on the course and I don't think it is much of a deterrent."