Clause 45
Road Safety Bill [Lords]
5:00 pm
Stephen Ladyman (Minister of State, Department for Transport; South Thanet, Labour)
There is an annual check in this country as well. When a person buys vehicle excise duty he has to fill in the appropriate forms and make contact with the DVLA. If the vehicle is more than three years old, there is a physical check on it when it is taken for its MOT test. One of the things that an MOT tester is expected to do is to check the number plate and ensure that it conforms with expectations.
There are checks, but there are equally people who cheat them. As the hon. Gentleman said, 18,000 people in the Stockholm area do not pay any form of taxes and are trying to cheat the system. I cannot remember off-hand exactly how many cars use the Stockholm congestion charging system, but I think that it is only about 300,000.