Be Sure To Be Insured - By Ren Withnell

Imagine this scenario for me if you will.

Your bike is taxed until the end of the year, December, and it is March right now.  Unfortunately your bike insurance is due for renewal tomorrow, but you're not planning to use the bike until the May Bank Holidays.  Not to worry, I'll not insure the bike right now, I'll insure it in May when the weather improves. 

The bike can remain in the garage, off the road where it's not going to hurt anyone.  No copper, rozzer or law enforcement agency can get me for riding with no insurance, because I'm NOT riding the bike...sorted!

Not any more...

Having had my licence renewed recently it came with a note, a leaflet.  In as plain english as I can put it, If your bike or car is taxed, it MUST be insured.  So in the scenario above, because the bike has a valid tax disc on it then it must also have valid insurance.  Even if it is sat in your garage, away from the streets, it must be insured.  The ONLY way that bike can sit in your garage with no insurance against it is if it has been SORNed. 

I guess this is to make it a little simpler for the authorities to track down those people who are uninsured.  The idea being that any vehicle uninsured bit NOT SORNed will get an immediate fine of £100, and if the vehicle remains uninsured they can come and sieze the vehicle even if it is NOT on the road.  In some ways I think this is a good thing, in other ways it's a bit "Big Brother" and I'm uncertain as to how well it will work in catching the real lawbreakers.

The most obvious thing to do is insure a car with the cheapest member of the family.  If 45 year old Dad insures young Jimmy Chav's Fiesta, and registers it in Dad's name too, that car will be pretty cheap.  It will not show up on the system as being uninsured or untaxed.  Still Jimmy Chav will blast dangerously around the streets safe in the knowledge he can pass any ANPR systems without raising an eyebrow.

If Pikey Tim who's mever had tax or insurance in his life, and probably no licence either, sees this, he'll laugh.  If the motor' not registered in his name, never been insured by him, never been taxed by him and he never stays in one place for long then ten thousand computers will still not be able to work out where his dodgy motor is.

My other concern is that because the computer's in control the police will reduce the work of trying to find uninsured drivers.  Because a handful of people are caught out by the new rules, the statistics will have been suitably massaged and the authorities look good.  But it won't stop hardcore offenders like those above.

Whatever else I may think, whatever you may think.  Just get insured.

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