Closed petition Stop plans to exempt vehicles more than 40 years old from roadworthiness tests

Closed on 27 March 2018

The Department for Transport has announced that it intends to exempt most vehicles that are more than 40 years old from annual roadworthiness tests (MoT) from May 2018.

The Government should reconsider this and aim for all vehicles to be given independent annual inspections for safety reasons.

When respondents to the Government’s consultation were asked whether these vehicles – including many classic cars and motorcycles – should be exempted from MoT tests, more than half were opposed. The DfT's own figures indicate that only 6% of pre-1960 vehicles, already exempt, are voluntarily tested. If this is also the case for vehicles over 40 years old when the exemption is introduced then there is a risk that safety-critical faults on more than 293,000 vehicles will not be detected.