Merseyside Police cars spotted with out-of-date tax discs

May 9 2009 by Kevin Core, Liverpool Echo

Out of date tax disc on police car 460

RED-faced police chiefs promised to review procedures today – after three patrol cars parked outside a station had out-of-date tax discs.

The cars were spotted outside Birkenhead Police Station, in Mortimer Street, on Thursday.

One of the discs expired in September 2008 and the other two lapsed at the end of last month.

Police first wrongly claimed their vehicles need not display up-to-date tax discs – before eventually vowing to review procedures.

A force spokeswoman claimed the discs with April 2009 expiry dates were not technically an offence because motorists were allowed five working days’ grace to renew their tax.

And the spokeswoman said the third car did have a valid 2009 tax which must have “slipped or blown out of view”.

Darren Wheatley, of the DVLA, said today: “The law requires every vehicle that is used or kept on a public road to display a valid tax disc.

“However as a customer service improvement measure an exemption from the offence of not displaying a tax disc for the first five working days at the start of a month was introduced on September 1.