Fast Marina Magazine

Another Silver/white figures on black plates hater here - fine on Pre 1973 vehicles but not on anything after that year.

I also hate those pressed plates from 1981 with the strange font, luckily, they did not last very long!

SERCK plates? They made them for quite a few years. My girlfriend's 1987 Renault 5 has them, plastic reflective ones.

Black plates with silver / white digits should not be fitted to a car after Jan 1973 but if they change the rules then fine to fit them as it lets an older car stand out from the crowd.
Must admit I see many minis which should not have them on and they try to make it look like it is older than it is.
Shame the law is not enforced harder but I expect it is down to priority and man power but if you have illegal plates fitted don't be surprised when you get pulled
Miss spaced and wrong font number plates are just as bad.

I've had 'illegal' plates on motorbikes for 22 years and never been pulled and never failed an mot. Like anyone gives a dam.

I've also had silver and black plates on Marinas for the last 7-8 years and never had any problems.

Current fad for the yoofs round here is to have the front 'plate in the windscreen, no- one seems particularly inclined to do anything about it despite them not being visible half the time so I can't imagine you'd get in trouble for the wrong style on an obviously classic car.

That said I did actually get a ticking off for having black and silver plates on Mud a few years ago, they were doing random spot checks one Friday night & I got got. Just got told to change them though. Given that there was only a year in it I must have been unlucky- but I prefer the white & yellow ones anyway.

They hit wrongly spaced and wrong font plates hard because they are deliberately 'obstructive' to things like ANPR, colour and style of plate aren't such an issue (although someone will claim they are) as they then have to prove they weren't original fit, especially on older cars.

I've also had silver and black plates on Marinas for the last 7-8 years and never had any problems.

I know as soon as I put illegal plates on mine I will get done for it. That's my luck.
I got a ticket for parking on the pavement outside my house many years back, probably rightly so. BUT, I had been there 20 minutes and I have seen others parked there forever without getting a fine
Only left it there as dinner was ready and to get it off the road would mean moving cars around so I just popped in to have dinner rather than let it get cold. I had only had about 10 fork fulls before a knock at the door!

May the Police don't do much down in the West?

Latest on this the DVLA have received clarification from the DVLA. It seems that the detailed provision in the legislation is as follows

Schedule 2 Part 2 The Road Vehicles (Display of Registration Marks) Regs 2001

"Vehicles registered on or after 1st January 1973 and before 1st September 2001".

It seems that the regs linked black and white plates to the Historic Vehicle regulations. It's an unintended consequence but it will stand.




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Here is the complete extract from the FBHVC newsletter.


My thanks to several members who contacted me to express doubts over the item in the last Newsletter concerning non-reflective number plates. In fact that information is correct and I am grateful to DVLA for supplying this detailed explanation.

The previous Regulations on the display of registration marks had only ever permitted vehicles manufactured before 1973 to use black and white number plates. However, the changes to the law in 2001 which introduced the new (and current) number plate format directly linked the pre-1973 vehicles with those which were in the historic tax class (which had the same dates). This meant that when the changes to the historic tax class dates were announced in recent Budgets, this had the unintended consequence of amending the display Regulations to allow additional vehicles to display black and white plates.

For those wanting chapter and verse the detailed provisions in Schedule 2 Part 2 of The Road Vehicles (Display of Registration Marks) Regulations 2001 state that ‘VEHICLES REGISTERED ON OR AFTER 1ST JANUARY 1973 AND BEFORE 1ST SEPTEMBER 2001‘ must have white and yellow reflective plates, either of the current design or the previous, but Regulation 18 provides that exempt vehicles shall be treated for these regulations as registered before that date, so they therefore fall into Schedule 2 Part 3 ‘VEHICLES REGISTERED BEFORE 1ST JANUARY 1973‘ It should be noted that DVLA publication INF 104 has not yet been amended to reflect this situation.


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