Quality cars saved from crusher

Jul 8 2009 Ian Johnson

Quality cars saved from crusher

ONE of the most stupid and wasteful decisions ever taken has to be the wanton crushing of unclaimed quality cars seized for road-tax evasion.

By all means take them, but for goodness sake why destroy them? When the country is trying to conserve materials and energy this is wasteful in the extreme - almost making the car out to be the offender.

But it looks as though this daft policy is being consigned to the crusher itself because in a landmark deal, quality models seized on behalf of the DVLA for road tax evasion will no longer be automatically scrapped, but auctioned off instead.

This keeps good examples on the road and earns money for the DVLA.

More than 100,000 untaxed vehicles are seized every year. They are held at secure yards around the UK for up to 14 days. Until now, all vehicles that are not claimed within that time have been sent to the crusher, regardless of their value.

Following a successful eight-month trial, Newport Auctions, an independent auction house in South Wales, has now scooped the nationwide contract to save the most valuable vehicles from the scrap heap.

A fortnightly auction will feature approximately 150 valuable cars, motorbikes and commercial vehicles, all of which have been unclaimed after seizure.

I can only add one further comment - why didn't they think of it before?