Mr. Alan Doyle:

I thank the Chairman and committee members for the invitation to address them. I represent the Vintage Veteran Trucks Association in Ireland which has a wide membership across the country. We are involved in the important restoration of vintage veteran trucks and trailers. We restore them to their original condition and participate in a number of social events throughout the year for the purpose of showing our restored vehicles and raising money for various charities. Our vehicles are restored to the highest standards with due care and attention to safety standards. They are only used for social and domestic purposes; they are not commercial vehicles. We enjoy reduced vintage insurance premia and our vehicles are classed as vintage veteran vehicles for the purposes of road tax at the reduced rate.

In 2012 we became aware that there was new legislation, the Road Safety Authority (Commercial Vehicle Roadworthiness) Act 2012, under which the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport could make regulations for the testing of vehicles and provide for exemptions from testing for certain vehicles. We wrote to the Minister, Deputy Leo Varadkar, in September 2012 requesting that when he made regulations, he exempt our vintage veteran vehicles from roadworthiness testing. We further became aware that he had made regulations, SI 347 of 2013, providing for an exemption for pre-1980 motor caravans, but he did not provide for the exemption of our vehicles, as requested. In January 2014 we again wrote to him requesting that he include our vehicles in the regulations. We received a reply from the Road Safety Authority stating that as these vehicles could be used for commercial purposes, they had to be tested. We again wrote to the Minister in February to point out that our vehicles were not commercial vehicles and that they were only used for social and domestic purposes. We provided him with a suggested text to amend the regulations to exclude pre-1980 vintage vehicles.

We received an acknowledgement stating a further reply would issue. We have not received a further update.

I also attach for the committee's information a submission made to the Minister which sets out the reasons we consider our vehicles should be exempt from roadworthiness testing. We ask the committee to request the Minister to amend the regulations to provide for the exemptions we require in order that our vehicles can be treated equally to other pre-1980 vintage vehicles in Ireland such as cars, motor caravans, tractors and motor cycles.

Committee members might note exemptions for vintage veteran vehicles are being discussed at EU level and included in the documentation provided for them is a paper provided for Irish Vintage and Veteran Car Club Limited by the Fédération Internationale des Véhicules Anciens, FIVA. This organisation represents and promotes the interests of historic vehicle owners throughout the European Union and the world and engages on policy issues at EU level. Also included with the documentation are sample photographs of our vintage veteran vehicles. I thank the committee for giving us this opportunity to address it.