Rant For the love of God

[Job]

In it's endless strive to reduce red tape the Government has decided to add about 2000 miles of it to car insurance.
Just the same as car tax it is now illegal to not tell the government you aren't breaking the law.
They are making it illegal to take your car OFF the road ,where it doesn't need insurance, and not telling them that you have.
So you now have to SORN it and somehow in someones tiny brain they think this will reduce the numbers of people driving without insurance.
They even add this claim to the end of every statement as if it's a fact that every uninsured driver will now go out and buy insurance because it's ever so slightly more illegal than it was.
This is about he same as sending every man-woman in the country a form they have to sign to confirm they wont be breaking into houses in an attempt to reduce burglary figures.

'Parked' vehicles now need insurance | Money | The Guardian

 

[Chilly]

I think it's a pretty good idea. Don't really see the drawbacks. You probably shouldnt have a car sat in your driveway doing nothing for no good reason.

 

[Shagrat]

Really can't see that having any impact on uninsured drivers. Stupid idea.

Although if it's off the road and SORN'ed you dont have to do anything else, if I'm reading it right? so thats not that much of a change is it?

 

[Lamp]

Before I sold it, I used to have an old car SORN'd in my drive for 3 years. The car was mine. The property was entirely mine. Its no business of anyone what I do with either. If I had to have had it insured, I would have sold it at the earliest opportunity. Why would I pay insurance for an off-road car?

 

[Job]

You don't need insurance if you SORN it, but if you forget to SORN it, even if it's in bits in your garage, you'll get a fine, basically for not updating the great british databaseoffuckineverything they are building.
Drivers are just going to SORN and continue driving on the road, a fine for using a SORN'd car is hardly anything compared to the 6 points and fine for not having insurance.
A few people might say 'oh fuck they know I'm not insured', but they'll know that anyway when that traffic cop's reg recognition software picks you up . They're not going to sit outside the house of everyone who SORN's their car.

 

[Helme]

If I understand this right, we've had this here forever and its really just one phonecall. I'd say focus your government anger elsewhere where it'll be slightly more productive tbh

 

[Lamp]

OK

Well to be honest, to SORN a vehicle takes less than a minute online. If you don't declare it off road, then its technically on-road I guess so you have to pay tax etc...

 

[Job]

Oh my Gods, you just said it, if it's not on the database 'it's not happening in real life..LOL you sound like every database admin I spoke to in my time in telecoms.

 

[Shagrat]

OK

Well to be honest, to SORN a vehicle takes less than a minute online. If you don't declare it off road, then its technically on-road I guess so you have to pay tax etc...

yep pretty much. get letter, go to website, enter code, click button.

no excuse for not doing it really.

 

[Job]

Jesus, they won't have any problem here when the next Spanish Inquisition rolls into town

 

[JingleBells]

Let me get this straight:
Previously
You own a car, to drive it legally on the road it needs insurance and a tax disc (and an MoT)
If you don't want to pay for a tax-disc then you HAVE to SORN it and can't drive it (legally)
To get the tax-disc when it's renewed you have to have valid insurance.
If the car is in bits, then why would you bother having a tax-disc - so just SORN it
If the car is say, a soft top British sports car stored in the garage for the winter, you'll probably have a tax-disc for it but don't have to insure it unless you want to drive it in summer

Now
You own a car, to drive it legally on the road it still needs insurance and a tax disc (and an MoT)
If you don't want to pay for a tax-disc then you HAVE to SORN it and can't drive it and can't drive it (legally)
To get the tax-disc when it's renewed you have to have valid insurance.
If the car is in bits, then why would you bother having a tax-disc - so just SORN it
If the car is say, a soft top British sports car stored in the garage for the winter, you'll probably have a tax-disc for it, which means it must be insured

As far as I can tell the bold bit is the only difference - essentially they're tying having a tax-disc to having valid insurance, which when road tax-renewal rolls round is a pre-requisite

This isn't going to save any money, unless they just roll road-tax into insurance tbh

 

[Job]

You have to surrender your tax when you SORN it.
Actually physically send the piece of paper back. (it got robbed officer).
It's miles of red tape for no benefit, they have a robust system for uninsured drivers, that could be vastly improved by linking (I thinks it's VODAFONES?,) network of number plate recognition cameras to the MID database, you know, to catch the people actually DRIVING uninsured as opposed to people who forgot to update a database and haven't even got a working engine in the car..

 

[Scouse]

You probably shouldnt have a car sat in your driveway doing nothing for no good reason.

Why the fuck not?

What if your reason is that you like to poke your dick in the exhaust and bring yourself off that way?

It's not my bag, but if that's what someone wants to do then I've no problem whatsoever in them doing it.

In fact, I'm all for it because there's a small chance they'll get photographed doing it which would be fucking hilarious for the rest of us.


Don't be so quick to pull out the "no good reason" line - "personal whim" IS a good reason...

 

[Job]

Another twist is what constitutes a car, you can't just take the engine out, the 1961 law states if it resembles a car and is incapacitated in such a way that is repairable within a reasonable timescale, it's still a car.
Basically you'd need a good lawyer to prove it wasn't and a Judge who didn't think you were a twat, possibly a car seat with a number plate on the back would be oK, but if it's got a bodyshell, you'd be on thin ice.

 

[Job]

And what about the thousands of people who don't even put the car in their name, which has to be the most sensible route for insuranceless driving,
you can do a runner if pulled over, no speeding tickets, no parking tickets, no tax or MOT, fuck me, my cars are in my name..what a mug.
They steal number plates, clone number plates or just make them up, how's it going to catch them?

 

[ST^]

It's not that much red tape, and affects almost nobody. I think I'll file this one under nobodygivesafuck

 

[Scouse]

ST^ - do you give a fuck about anything that doesn't affect you directly?

 

[Job]

Holy fook, I've just checked my filing (bottom drawer under, 80's jeans with rip holes in the knees) I've got 11 vehicles still in my name, including an f-reg 4x4 sierra, a y-reg Escort turbo, an s-reg range rover, 5 old motorbikes and afew other cars, they must have cutoff point, because I've heard nothing from the DVLA about them..crosses fingers.

 

[Zenith.UK]

It's in the article...

Vehicles with a valid Sorn will not need to be insured.

If you're not using it, SORN it. It's what I've done.
I want to know how you get it to a garage to get it's MOT, so you can get the tax disk to allow you to drive it on the road.

 

[old.Tohtori]

So what is the actual harm here, besides mailing some papers. For you personally that is. More costs?

'cause if it's just "have to post more sh*t", then get over it

 

[ford prefect]

It takes like two minutes to register a vehicle as SORN online, I don't really see the issue.

 

[Job]

Well the issue is it's supposed to catch all those people who drive uninsured and
as discussed is hardly the ideal way to go about it, they are just introducing a layer of red tape designed to nail the law abiders even tighter to the floor, while the law breakers just sail by unaffected.

 

[ford prefect]

I own one car and six bikes, some of which I only drive in the summer, but obviously I have to pay full tax and insurance, which isn't an issue - they may get stolen one day. I also have two other bikes I am in the process of rebuilding. Now both of those bikes are over 1549cc, so are obviously SORN otherwise I would be paying road over £400 in road tax for them this year. TBH I don't see why you wouldn't SORN a vehicle that isn't road worthy or not in use in the longterm.

 

[Job]

I can't repeat the actual point of my complaint anymore. sorn is with us now, it doesn't stop people not taxing or insuring their vehicles, it is just another database for us to fill in with a fine if we don't, they have no method beyond the ones allready in place to prove you are not just sorning and driving as normal, it serves no practical purpose.

 

[ford prefect]

As I understand it, the new law gives the DVLA the power to compare Motor Insurance Database against their own Registered Keepers database, which they couldn't do before. Surely that allows them to see if a vehicle is untaxed/uninsured and not SORN?

 

[Job]

Of course they can snd so can traffic cops, but if you sorn they leave you alone unless you get caught on the road, which is exactly as it was before sorn

 

[Access Denied]

The only difference I see is that you have to send your tax disc in with the SORN. Which as has already been said, will screw over people who only insure their cars for a few months at a time. They'll just have to pay to renew a tax disc that technically hasn't run out yet. Sneaky move by the government to get more money out of us.

 

[ford prefect]

Yes, but by comparing those databases they can automatically issue fines and prosecution notices, which they couldn't before. From what I have been told talking to the police, detecting uninsured drivers at the moment generally involves insurance companies volunteering data which they are legally not obliged to do; number plate recognition on motorways and police to pull drivers all of which seems a lot of resources for little benefit to road safety. It may cause a problem for a small amount of people when insurance companies make mistakes, but other than that it seems like a good idea to clarify the issue as a point of law.

 

[Tom]

Tax discs are a load of bollocks anyway, another way to raise revenue. They should be rendered obsolete, and the difference placed on fuel duty.

 

[ford prefect]

Australia has an interesting system. They pay higher road tax than we do, but it includes basic road insurance, so the moment a vehicle is taxed, it is insured. Over there you only go with a third part company if you want fully comp or named drivers ect.