A motorhome driver has been fined £400 for careless driving.

Sixty-two-year-old Charles Nigel Price overtook a cyclist while a vehicle was coming in the opposite direction.

He appeared before High Bailiff James Brooks recently, pleading guilty to the offence and also had his licence endorsed with four points.

Prosecuting advocate Hazel Carroon told the court that Price was driving a Fiat Swift motorhome, on June 16, at Bridge Road in Ballasalla.

He was said to have overtaken a cyclist prior to a right hand bend.

A vehicle coming in the opposite direction stopped to allow the motorhome to get back onto its own side of the road.

When spoken to by police, Price said: ‘I don’t consider I was driving without due care or attention.’

He was shown footage of the incident, but described it as a ‘non-event’, and said he was back almost over the centre lines, and had not seen the other vehicle stopping.

Price said he didn’t remember the overtake, and if it had been unsafe, he would have remembered it.

The court heard that the defendant, who lives at St Mary’s Road in Port Erin, has no previous convictions.

Defence advocate John Wright entered a basis of plea on behalf of his client, in which Price admitted careless driving in relation to the oncoming vehicle, but not in relation to the cyclist.

Mr Wright said the defendant had possibly been giving the cyclist a wide berth when the offence occurred.

A letter was handed in written by Price, apologising for the incident.

He accepted that the other car had to decelerate.

Mr Wright said it’d been a momentary lapse of concentration, and his client’s first offence in 45 years of driving.

Price must also pay £50 prosecution costs and will pay within seven days.