Noel Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail)

There is a difficulty in terms of people not having their tags fitted properly or having damaged registration plates and so on. There is also a difficulty where people have not updated their registration numbers on to the eFlow or other systems in place. The NRA has engaged with all the companies and cross-checking is being carried out. Some people's cars have not been updated on the national vehicle and driver file, NVDF, for one reason or another. I know of one instance where a car that was scrapped apparently went through the system because there was a problem with the garage completion certificate.

There are problems. In fairness to the NRA, it made it clear at the outset that there would be teething problems with the system. The initial problems with the call centre caused the public the greatest amount of aggravation. People had to wait for a long time to talk to someone — some people had to hang up and try again — because a substantial number of calls were being received. The call centre was handling approximately 12,000 calls a day. I understand that the response rate has been improved to the extent that 71% of calls are now answered within 20 seconds. Just 2.4% of calls are not answered.

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