Today's DT reports that 1 in 15 motorists do not pay road tax and that this includes 37% of all motorcyclists. I make no comment other than that if this is the best the government can do with cameras all over the country and a vast computer in Swansea, it doesn't look good for computer/camera based road charging or ID cards!
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Today's DT reports that 1 in 15 motorists do not pay road tax and that this includes 37% of all motorcyclists. >>
Presumably though, AS, the 37% figure for motorcyclists will include arch-criminals such as myself who forgot to retax/sorn their motorcycle whilst it languished in the garage over winter! The bike hadn't been used on the road at all, so it riles me even more to read that 'more than half of those caught DRIVING an untaxed vehicle are never punished'.
Also in today's Telegraph (p25), there's an interesting piece by a policeman (pseudonym 'David Copperfield') about how the police are being forced to waste their time on petty incidents in order to 'improve' crime statistics - rather than catching real criminals.
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Right with you waino! DC has also published a book on modern policing "Wasting Police Time" which is well worth a read and explains how it is that we have57 officers in the office doing Home Office paperwork for each one officer out in the real World. He describes how he made an arrest at 1600 and finished the paperwork at 00.30 the next morning! Totally barking!
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I find it hard to believe that there really are that many people not paying tax. I'd wager that half of those are vehicles with sorns, e.g. motorbikes and classics laid up over the winter.
I would also wager that many of those driving without tax don't have the car registered in their name, not much that the cameras can do about those...
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ever increasing numbers of cars with cloned plates which can do as they please with no worry about cameras
ever increasing number of foreign registered cars which are routinely let off with every offence under the sun
large numbers of "travellers" who the politically correct police and criminal injustice system choose to leave alone whatever they do
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I find that 37% of motorcycles being untaxed on the road very difficult to believe.
Now 37% of bikes untaxed, possibly, even likely - but over winter and in the garage, not on the road.
This ANPR thing must be failing dismally if they can't make a dent in these car and bike figures.
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Imagine the scenario that you wish to ride your machine out to the shires on a Sunday or bank holiday, in a group, at warp speed. To avoid detection and follow up, ride unregistered. So far as you're concerned the registration plate gives a false trail, and at the speeds achieved the only way for the police to intervene is to use road-blocks (not on the fast bits) or helicopters. The rest of the time the bikes in the shed - never in slow moving traffic on a weekday. I know there are many legal bikes, ridden sensibly, but 120mph B road riders, the centre line and double white line crossers must be pretty confident they won't be traced.
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Not too far from where I live there is a very large camp of 'travellers' - many of them drive a horse and cart, at least they are not dodging the road tax! Not so sure about the condition of their cars, transits and 4x4s though.
main problem with our 'local travellers' is that they burn rubbish every evening (I assume its the waste from jobs during the day) which gives off rather nasty burning plastic type smoke - if the wind blows in the wrong direction we have to keep the windows closed (not nice in the summer). I know its not motoring but if anyone has any ideas on how to do something about it...
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Get onto your Local Council PDQ! Many lines of complaint but the best would probably be Health and Safety implications of the poisons in burning plastics - unless you live in a smoke free zone.
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When we got a car for free recently, we thought it had come taxed, but it quickly became apparent that the tax disc was a disabled one (red coloured) so illegal.
I'd put money on a lot of people letting that run until it ran out next year, but we couldn't be doing with the risk and got it replaced.
You just know that if we'd not noticed and left it on there a couple of weeks, we'd be the only "tax evaders" in the North East to be collared this year. The police don't care about stuff like this, and that's the problem.
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>>I find that 37% of motorcycles being untaxed on the road very difficult to believe.
I do too, that equates to over one in three bikes being untaxed and quite frankly on the face of it that sounds ridiculous. I don't know who comes up with (or manipulates) these statistics but that is just completely misleading. Maybe they are including the sorn'd bikes over the winter and the ones that are lying redundant in peoples back yards, but almost certainly not the ones used on the roads day to day.
I have said it before and I'll say it again. I class myself as a biker and associate with large numbers of other like minded people. I don't know any who actively dodge their road tax, why would they - its not exactly loads of money for a bike tax disc.
>>Imagine the scenario that you wish to ride your machine out to the shires on a Sunday or
>>bank holiday, in a group, at warp speed. To avoid detection and follow up, ride unregistered...
>>The rest of the time the bikes in the shed - never in slow moving traffic on a weekday. I know
>>there are many legal bikes, ridden sensibly, but 120mph B road riders, the centre line and
>>double white line crossers must be pretty confident they won't be traced.
Nice theory there nortones2, but you are way way off the mark. I can see how and why you may think that but the reality is somewhat different. What you do tend to find is that the 'weekend warriors' are very bike proud and spend copious amounts of time and money making their bike very smart and pretty. They don't drag an old rat bike out of the shed for a sunday blast, they tend to be highly polished bling bling toys. And these toys (in my experience) are always registered, taxed, insured and MOT'd. In fact most of these 'sunday' bikes are low mileage, tip-top condition bikes that spend more time having loving attention languished upon them than they actually get ridden.
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Never said they weren't road worthy or indeed weren't the latest device made for the job. Just that I'm pretty sure they must be confident in their invisibility.
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Jase1, colour of disc has nothing to do with disabled - they use ordinary discs but it has 'disabled' typed or written on the disc and £0.00 for tax payable. But very glad to hear you did replace it and change status of car!
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I find 37% of bikes untaxed hard to believe as well.
I did a short 'survey' while judging at a bike club run "up north" a few years ago.
8/10 bikes had no visible tax disc so more like 80% based on that information. ;>)
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Most motorcyclists I know don't display their tax - me included - mine was actually nicked last year (and local Police turned it up on a Warrant when looking for something else !), mine stays at home and I'm happy to use diplomatic skills to negotiate with Police if I was stopped. Illegal but sensible.
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Most motorcyclists I know don't display their tax - me included - mine was actually nicked last year (and local Police turned it up on a Warrant when looking for something else !)
Have you ever represented the..er fine person...who had possession of your tax disc? Just wondered.
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No. (I'll leave it at that - the horrid little snail)
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The 37% figure, and indeed all the others quoted, come from the National Audit Office. They are nothing to be pleased about but I can't think that NAO would exaggerate them! This would only make the Government look more incompetent than it really is, which is VERY!
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>>Most motorcyclists I know don't display their tax - me included
I don't display mine either, just so it doesn't get nicked off my bike. However I actually keep my disc under the (removable) rear pillion seat so if I did need to show it to an officer of the law etc, I could there and then. But my bike is never not taxed - even in the winter time.
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I display a photocopy with a note that says "rider carries disc" and it's tucked under the seat.
If they didn't charge so much for replacements from being nicked and rainsoaked, then I might have considered displaying the original.
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I find it difficult to believe how this is happening.
Vehicles should be either 'Taxed','SORNed', 'In Trade' or 'Scrapped'.
So if a vehicle is not 'Taxed' it should be 'SORNed'. Either way DVLA have powers to levy a fine.
So if they are not pursuing then they are not doing their job.
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Fullchat
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Yes Fullchat but if the vehicle is a 'clone' there is no way for the authorities no know this as it goes past an ANPR camera and no registered keeper or owner address except of the poor bod whose car has been cloned. Get the untaxed uninsured unlicencensed brigade off the road with a zero tolerance policy of crushing offenders cars, except (wait for it!) DVLA records are such a mess that even they don't really know what is taxed and insured, what driver has what vehicle types on their licence etc etc so too many legal cars would be crushed in error.
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