Council Directive 1999/37/ECShow full title

Article 1 U.K.

This Directive shall apply to the documents issued by the Member States at the time of registration of vehicles.

It shall not prejudice the right of Member States to use, for the temporary registration of vehicles, documents which may not meet the requirements of this Directive in every respect.

Article 2 U.K.

For the purposes of this Directive:

(a)

‘vehicle’: shall mean any vehicle as defined in Article 2 of Council Directive 70/156/EEC of 6 February 1970 on the approximation of the laws of the Member States relating to the type-approval of motor vehicles and their trailers(1) and in Article 1 of Council Directive 92/61/EEC of 30 June 1992 relating to the type-approval of two or three-wheel motor vehicles(2);

(b)

‘registration’: shall mean the administrative authorisation for the entry into service in road traffic of a vehicle, involving the identification of the latter and the issuing to it of a serial number, to be known as the registration number;

(c)

‘registration certificate’: shall mean the document which certifies that the vehicle is registered in a Member State;

(d)

‘holder of the registration certificate’: shall mean the person in whose name a vehicle is registered.

Article 3 U.K.

1. Member States shall issue a registration certificate for vehicles which are subject to registration under their national legislation. The certificate shall consist of either a single part in accordance with Annex I or two parts in accordance with Annexes I and II.

Member States may authorise the services they appoint to this end, in particular those of the manufacturers, to fill in the technical parts of the registration certificate.

2. Where a new registration certificate is issued for a vehicle registered prior to the implementation of this Directive, Member States shall use a certification model as defined in this Directive and may limit the particulars shown therein to those for which the required data are available.

3. The data given in the registration certificate, in accordance with Annexes I and II, shall be represented by the harmonised Community codes shown in those Annexes.

Article 4 U.K.

For the purposes of this Directive, the registration certificate issued by a Member State shall be recognised by the other Member States for the identification of the vehicle in international traffic or for its re-registration in another Member State.

Article 5 U.K.

1. For the purposes of identifying a vehicle in road traffic, Member States may require that the driver carry Part I of the registration certificate.

2. With a view to re-registering a vehicle previously registered in another Member State, the competent authorities shall require the submission of Part I of the previous registration certificate in every case and the submission of Part II if it was issued. These authorities shall withdraw the part(s) of the previous registration certificate submitted and shall keep the latter for a minimum of six months. They shall, within two months, inform the authorities of the Member State which delivered the certificate of its withdrawal. They shall return the certificate which they have withdrawn to those authorities if they so request within six months of its withdrawal.

Where the registration certificate consists of Parts I and II, and Part II is missing, the competent authorities in the Member State where the new registration has been requested may decide, in exceptional cases, to re-register the vehicle, but only after having obtained confirmation, in writing or by electronic means, from the competent authorities in the Member State where the vehicle was previously registered, that the applicant is entitled to re-register the vehicle in another Member State.

Article 6 U.K.

Any amendments necessary in order to adapt the Annexes to this Directive to technical progress shall be adopted in accordance with the procedure laid down in Article 7.

Article 7 U.K.

1. Where reference is made to the procedure provided for in this Article, the Commission shall be assisted by the committee established by Article 8 of Council Directive 96/96/EC of 20 December 1996 on the approximation of the laws of the Member States relating to roadworthiness tests for motor vehicles and their trailers(3), hereinafter referred to as the ‘committee’, which shall consist of representatives of the Member States with a representative of the Commission in the chair.

2. The representative of the Commission shall submit to the committee a draft of the measures to be taken. The committee shall deliver its opinion on the draft within a time limit which the chairman may lay down according to the urgency of the matter. The opinion shall be delivered by the majority laid down in Article 148(2) of the Treaty in the case of decisions which the Council is required to adopt on a proposal from the Commission. The votes of the representatives of the Member States within the committee shall be weighted in the manner set out in that Article. The chairman shall not vote.

3. (a) The Commission shall adopt the measures envisaged if they are in accordance with the opinion of the committee.

(b) If the measures envisaged are not accordance with the opinion of the committee, or if no opinion is delivered, the Commission shall, without delay, submit to the Council a proposal relating to the measures to be taken. The Council shall act by a qualified majority.

If, within three months of the submission of the proposal to the Council, the Council has not acted, the proposed measures shall be adopted by the Commission.

Article 8 U.K.

1. Member States shall bring into force the laws, regulations or administration provisions necessary to comply with this Directive by 1 June 2004. They shall notify the Commission thereof immediately.

When Member States adopt these provisions, they shall contain a reference to this Directive or be accompanied by such reference at the time of their official publication. The methods of making such reference shall be laid down by Member States.

2. Member States shall communicate to the Commission the text of the main provisions of national law which they adopt in the field governed by this Directive.

The Commission shall communicate to the Member States all the models for registration certificates used by the national administration.

Article 9 U.K.

Member States shall assist one another in the implementation of this Directive. They may exchange information at bilateral or multilateral level in particular so as to check, before any registration of a vehicle, the latter's legal status, where necessary in the Member State in which it was previously registered. Such checking may in particular involve the use of an electronic network.

Article 10 U.K.

This Directive shall enter into force on the day of its publication in the Official Journal of the European Communities.

Article 11 U.K.

This Directive is addressed to the Member States.