Police Crush an Uninsured Vehicle every 9 Minutes

Police are crushing cars, vans or motorcycles owned by uninsured drivers at the rate of one every nine minutes.

Around 500 uninsured vehicles are seized every day and a third are crushed.

Traffic police in the West Midlands have just grabbed the one millionth car as part of a national campaign to curb driving without insurance.

That still leaves 1.2 million vehicles on the road without insurance – an average of 1 in 25.

Simon Douglas, director of AA Insurance, says: “A million cars seized is great news. The MIB, which provides compensation to innocent victims involved in collisions with uninsured drivers and drivers who fail to stop, is doing great work with the police and community leaders to get through to persistent offenders.

“But we are still a long way from cleaning up Britain’s roads. In uninsured driver hot-spots such as parts of Birmingham, innocent motorist are eight times more likely than average to be hit by an uninsured vehicle.”

West Midlands Police, which covers Birmingham, is seizing one uninsured vehicle per hour.

Police identify them with automatic number plate recognition technology which compares registration numbers against data provided by the Motor Insurance Database (MID).

“Every year, uninsured drivers kill 160 and injure 23,000 innocent people,” said Douglas. “What’s more this adds around £33 to every honestly-bought car insurance policy. It is not a victimless crime.”

Douglas argues that penalties for uninsured drivers are too lenient.

“Honest young drivers may have to pay £3,000 or more for their first car insurance policy, a figure that has been pushed up by uninsured drivers, yet the average fine for driving without cover is only about £200.  Many go on to reoffend.

“Most are young men often with a string of motoring and other offences behind them and may not have a driving license.  Their cars are frequently poorly maintained, have no MoT or tax and are driven with little regard for traffic laws.”