Joe Costello (Dublin Central, Labour)
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Question 126: To ask the Minister for Transport if he will introduce a compulsory system of reporting of car write-offs; the number of imported cars that the Revenue Commissioners have informed his Department are potential car write-offs; the number of people his Department have written to warning them of the potential unroadworthiness of their cars; if he will establish a central and comprehensive register of all vehicles that have been classified as unsafe and unroadworthy; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23276/08]

Noel Dempsey (Meath West, Fianna Fail)
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As I indicated in response to a similar question put down by Deputy Upton on 8th May 2008, following analysis of data relating to some 5,400 written off vehicles which has been provided voluntarily by one major insurer against the 2.4 million active vehicles on the NVDF the Department has written to the registered owners of some 261 vehicles which the records indicate may still be in use on public roads.

With the assistance of the Irish Insurance Federation, the insurance industry has agreed to make the necessary data relating to other insurers available voluntarily. I expect this to happen shortly and the process of validating it against the NVDF can then be carried out.

Moreover, voluntary arrangements have been put in place with the insurance industry whereby the NVDF will receive regular notifications of write off instances. This will enable the NVDF to have current write off data and I am favourably disposed to having a period of evaluation of these voluntary arrangements before considering what, if any, compulsory obligations are warranted.

To date the Revenue Commissioners have not notified the Department of write off vehicle instances presented for registration. However work is underway on both the NVDF and the Revenue computer systems so that information in relation to written off vehicles can be automatically transmitted from Revenue to the Department where that information is available at the time of registration.