Tuesday 20th January 2009

Time Up for Uninsured Drivers

New regulations make it an offence to own an uninsured vehicle

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6.5% of cars on the road are uninsured

New rules on insuring vehicles have been set out that will make life much harder for those who own taxed vehicles without insurance.

Road Safety Minister Jim Fitzpatrick today announced that it will become an offence to keep an uninsured vehicle. Current law only punishes people for driving an uninsured vehicle, meaning that people can only be caught on the road.

These new regulations will follow existing rules on road tax in making it possible to identify uninsured vehicles using databases from the DVLA and the insurance industry.

Cars identified as uninsured will be flagged up, and a warning letter sent to the car's registered keeper. Failure to respond to the warning letter will result in a £100 fine, and failing that the owner could find their car seized and crushed.

Around 2 million motorists are estimated to drive around uninsured (6.5% of all motorists in the UK), and these drivers are said to add approximately £30 per year to all of our insurance premiums.

Mr Fitzpatrick said: 'The selfish minority of drivers who refuse to insure their cars push up premiums for other motorists and kill or injure thousands of people each year.'

The new regulation does not affect cars with Statutory Off Road Notices (SORN).

[dwilkie]

So they'll be bringing down the insurance premiums to reflect the lowered risk of uninsured drivers then?

I thought not.