Missed car tax payment, fined by DVLA

GingerBob_3

DUTR wrote: »

Road tax was done away with long before you were born, it's Vehicle Excise Duty, I do not recall any of the proceeds being made available directly to build or repair roads.

I'm 102 years old.

You know what I mean.

Joe_Horner

Rover_Driver wrote: »

It is not a continous offence, it is using an unlicensed vehicle on a public road, each time it is used it is a separate offence.

Unlike being the registered keeper of an unlicensed vehicle, which is a 'one off' offence.

Except that the courts, in their wisdom and at the behest of DVLA and others, have decided that having your car parked on the road counts as "using it" on the road. So, unless you leave the road to (for example) park, it's continuous use.

Rover_Driver

Joe_Horner wrote: »

Except that the courts, in their wisdom and at the behest of DVLA and others, have decided that having your car parked on the road counts as "using it" on the road. So, unless you leave the road to (for example) park, it's continuous use.

The actual offence is using or keeping an unlicensed vehicle on a public road, so if it is being driven it is 'using', and each time is a separate offence. If it is parked it is 'keeping'.

It is the insurance requirement of the Road Traffic Act that the courts accept that 'using' includes 'available to be used'.

hardtofin

So, can you in effect be fine infinitely for this offence, if you keep using your car without knowing as we did. And accrue 200 £135 fines?

Rover_Driver

hardtofin wrote: »

So, can you in effect be fine infinitely for this offence, if you keep using your car without knowing as we did. And accrue 200 £135 fines?

Yes, each time you use it would be a separate offence.

Joe_Horner

Rover_Driver wrote: »

The actual offence is using or keeping an unlicensed vehicle on a public road, so if it is being driven it is 'using', and each time is a separate offence. If it is parked it is 'keeping'.

It is the insurance requirement of the Road Traffic Act that the courts accept that 'using' includes 'available to be used'.

No, they decided it in relation to insurance and MOT - where the only offence is for "using". In their infinite wisdom, the courts ruled that "using" included "having it available for use".

It would be extremely difficult to argue that "using" for VED purposes was distinct from the existing case law definition of "using" for other compulsory motoring requirements, especially if the sole purpose of such distinction was to impose multiple penalties for, essentially, the same act.

eta: Besides which, even if your interpretation were true, in order to make separate offences they would also have to prove, to a criminal standard, that you'd stopped "using" it in between times. You could conceivably been parking up and sleeping in it (which is undoubtedly "using") every night between the sightings.

Rover_Driver

Joe_Horner wrote: »

No, they decided it in relation to insurance and MOT - where the only offence is for "using". In their infinite wisdom, the courts ruled that "using" included "having it available for use".

It would be extremely difficult to argue that "using" for VED purposes was distinct from the existing case law definition of "using" for other compulsory motoring requirements, especially if the sole purpose of such distinction was to impose multiple penalties for, essentially, the same act.

eta: Besides which, even if your interpretation were true, in order to make separate offences they would also have to prove, to a criminal standard, that you'd stopped "using" it in between times. You could conceivably been parking up and sleeping in it (which is undoubtedly "using") every night between the sightings.

Different legislation.


MOT and Insurance are covered by s.47 and s.143, Road Traffic Act 1988, which only mentions 'use', and is accepted that it includes available to use - kept on the road.


Vehicle licensing is covered by The Vehicles Excise & Registration Act 1994. s.29 creates the offence of using or keeping an unlicensed vehicle on a public road, so, by the wording of the act, the offence is complete whether the vehicle is being used or just kept on a public road.


Of course, to prove separate offences, they would have to proved to be separate occasions of using.

arcon5

'Using' --- what if you had personal belongings in it? Thus, using it on a public road to store possessions...

Looooooooooooooooooooooong shot huh

Rover_Driver

arcon5 wrote: »

'Using' --- what if you had personal belongings in it? Thus, using it on a public road to store possessions...

Looooooooooooooooooooooong shot huh

That would be covered by the offence of 'keeping' it on a public road.

Tilt

Of course all this will be soon academic as after October, the tax disc will be obsolete so there will be more people "keeping" their cars on the public road without paying their VED.

And before people start saying "they will get automatic fines", what about those who choose not to register their cars in their names? Surely those numbers will increase dramatically as the only way they will be detected is if they get stopped or spotted by an ANPR equipped police car. Unless they are "using" the car, that is highly unlikely to happen.