An optician who drove a severely damaged Mercedes for 40 miles after crashing it into the central reservation of a Yorkshire motorway has been sentenced to a 12-month community order for dangerous driving.

Married father-of-two Rohali Nawaz was said to have taken a "cursory look" at the damage before getting back behind the wheel of the car and continuing his journey back home to Manchester.

The police received reports on the early evening of May 4 that the damaged vehicle was travelling southbound on the A1M and it was later spotted doing about 50mph along the M62 near Birstall.

Prosecutor Victoria Barker told Bradford Crown Court today that the motorway was busy and police officers in a pursuing vehicle signalled the 33-year-old to stop at the Hartshead Moor services.

She said a visual inspection revealed there was "obvious and significant" damage which made the vehicle unsafe to drive and a later inspection by a vehicle examiner confirmed that part of the car's suspension had been severed affecting its steering.

The court heard that one of its headlamps was insecure and sharp edges from the damaged front wing were rubbing on the front tyre causing a deep groove.

The examiner concluded that the damage had been caused by a "heavy frontal impact".

Nawaz, of Bury Old Road, said no other vehicles had been involved in the collision with the central reservation and he estimated that he had driven for about 40 miles before being stopped. He conceded that he could hear a scraping noise as the mud-guard touched the front wheel.

Nawaz pleaded guilty to a charge of dangerous driving back in August and his barrister Stephen Wood said the defendant would have to face a disciplinary hearing before the General Optical Council to decide if he was "a fit and proper person" to carry on working as an optician.

Mr Wood said his client had only taken a "cursory look" at the damage and the whole court process had been a shaming and salutory experience for Nawaz.

He submitted that Nawaz, who had no previous convictions, was a highly-qualified, hard-working and valued member of society.

Mr Wood described the incident as a "very negligent offence" rather than the usual cases of dangerous driving involving police pursuits.

Judge Neil Davey QC said he had taken account of Nawaz's previous good character and early guilty plea in deciding to impose the community order rather than a jail term or suspended prison sentence.

He said things could have gone disastrously wrong if some part of the damaged Mercedes, which was being leased by Nawaz, had been flung into the path of another vehicle. But he said Nawaz did not realise just how much of a danger the damaged car presented to other people.

Nawaz will have to do 100 hours' unpaid work for the community as part of his sentence and he was also banned from driving for 12 months.

At the end of the ban he will also have to take and pass an extended test before lawfully driving on the roads again.