Seán Sherlock
Question:51. Deputy Sean Sherlock asked the Minister for Transport if he will address the case of a person (details supplied). [56269/21]
View answerWednesday, 17 November 2021
Questions (51)
Written answers
As the Deputy will be aware, there is a facility in place to declare a vehicle off the road where it is not going to be in use in a public place. This is underpinned by the provisions of the Non-Use of Motor Vehicles Act 2013. The primary purpose of the Act is to replace the system whereby a vehicle was declared off the road retrospectively with a system under which the vehicle must be declared off the road in advance.
The current procedures, only allowing for a future declaration of non-use, have been fully in force since 1st October 2013. Under the revised procedures, an owner can indicate that a vehicle is going to be off the road by making a declaration of non-use at any time in the last month of an existing motor tax disc or previously made declaration of non-use. The declaration can be made online or through the vehicle owner's local motor tax office.
Where a declaration is not made in advance, motor tax must be paid for a minimum of 3 months, along with any arrears of motor tax, where applicable.
In this instance, I understand that tax on the vehicle in question expired at the end of December 2018. In order to declare the vehicle off the road, the Declaration should have been made at any time during that month. There is no record of a Declaration of Non-Use having been made in respect of the vehicle during December 2018, or during 2019, at which point the deadline for making the Declaration would already have passed.
Renewal notices, either electronically or in paper form, are issued to the registered owner of a vehicle in the last month of an extant tax disc. This is an administrative facility to enable ease of taxing and is not a necessary requirement for either taxing the vehicle or declaring it off the road.
Motor tax legislation does not provide for exemptions from the requirement to make a Declaration of Non-Use in individual cases, or for the waiving of arrears. You will appreciate the difficulties in providing for such exemptions or waivers in particular cases, given that other people have had to pay arrears in motor tax where the Declaration of Non-Use of a Motor Vehicle was not made on time, and the necessity generally of maintaining a consistent approach in the application of the legislation.