The Road Vehicles (Certificates of Temporary Exemption) Regulations 2020

EXPLANATORY NOTE

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

The Road Traffic Act 1988 generally prohibits the use of a motor vehicle, or a trailer that is a goods vehicle, on a road in Great Britain unless a test certificate has been issued for that vehicle within the past year. That Act also confers powers on the Secretary of State to make regulations governing the issue of certificates of temporary exemption for public service vehicles adapted to carry more than eight passengers and goods vehicles, which allow such vehicles to be used on roads without test certificates.

Those powers were reformed by the Business and Planning Act 2020 in response to disruption to the vehicle testing regime caused by the spread of coronavirus. This instrument is the first to be made under the new powers and provides for—

(a) vehicles to be exempt from the testing requirement while a certificate of temporary exemption applies (regulation 3);

(b) the circumstances in which such certificates can be issued, namely “exceptional circumstances” including an accident, a fire, an epidemic, severe weather, a failure in the supply of essential services or another unexpected event (regulation 4(1) and (3));

(c) the factors that may be considered by the Secretary of State when deciding whether to issue such certificates (regulation 4(2));

(d) the content of such certificates and their revocation (regulations 5 and 6);

(e) the revocation of the existing provisions governing the issue of such certificates (regulation 7).

No impact assessment has been prepared for these Regulations. An Explanatory Memorandum has been prepared for these Regulations and is available alongside this instrument on the UK Legislation website www.legislation.gov.uk.