A PIZZA firm worker who had a couple of drinks while settling a family crisis has been banned from driving and will lose his job.

Thomas Tollan, 59, of Reynolds Street, Burnley, was banned from driving for 12 months, fined £100 and ordered to pay £45 costs, after admitting driving with excess alcohol.

Nigel Harrison, prosecuting, said Tollan was stopped at 3pm on a Sunday. The lowest of two breath tests showed 55 microgrammes of alcohol in 100 millilitres of breath. The legal limit is 35.

Dylan Bradshaw, defending, said Tollan had been out on Saturday night and on Sunday his daughter contacted him to say she had split up with her husband. She asked to meet Tollan in a club where he had two to two and a half pints of lager.

He felt he would be fit to drive and there was no speeding or any collision.

He had an unblemished driving record since the 1970s and had been fit, active and working at the time of the offence.

He would now no longer be able to work.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.