A40 Farina Club

Spotted on page 6 of the Federation of British Historic Vehicle Clubs - Newsletter issue 2, 2023 - in which a clarification exercise is causing considerable alarm within the classic vehicle community. The following is a very shortened abstract:

DVLA report
The clarification exercise results from the many complaints that DVLA received from the Federation and others that over the last few years they have changed long-standing practices and apparently reneged on existing agreements without warning or explanation... In outline some of the issues involved are:-

Dating certificates from an existing manufacturer rejected for having a "digital" signature despite them having been accepted for many years;
Non-acceptance of build date stamped directly on the vehicle;
Non-acceptance of model year information encoded within VIN;

and most worrying of all -
Contrary to long-standing practice that like-for-like repairs to a vehicle were not considered to affect its identity or status, it now appears that any repairs to a chassis or monocoque will be regarded as a modification and the vehicle will no longer be considered as historic.

This last paragraph would of course drive a coach and horses through the entire restoration business, whether amateur or professional and naturally the FBHVC is totally committed to pursue this seemingly arbitrary set of rules. I urge you to visit www.fbhvc.co.uk and study the entire DVLA report.

That does sound worrying Keith and, if correct, would affect a huge percentage of vehicles. I'm not a member so can't access the newsletter, does it say what the implications are? Maybe we would have to tax and mot our cars again, which wouldn't be too awful.

Hi Clive, I'll try and scan the relevant page and put it up on here as a PDF.

FBHVC says the DVLA aren't very forthcoming about their progress with these issues but, as always, the Fed fights for all classic vehicles' owners and their rights.

Right, here's the page, reproduced with grateful thanks, from page six of the Fed's Newsletter Issue 2, 2023

Thanks Keith. It does read like something is afoot but little actual detail. Luckily the classic car industry is huge so I wouldn't have thought anything too drastic would happen just yet. I can imagine though that there will be pressure from the green lobby to get our cars off of the road eventually.