New tougher MOTs.

[Mr Pounder Esquire]

Prick.

[Dave Liquorice]

lights do

Blue lights? A very rare sight in this part of the world. The last lot of blue lights I saw around here (maybe two years ago) had me speed up so I could get to a place I knew could safely pull into and let them past (ambulance) before they caught up with me.

It's a distraction, as you try and work out if they are moving and if so are they on a different road or not. With dark rural roads and clean air, quite often the first "hint" you get of an oncoming vehical is their main beam straight into you eyes as they round a corner or crest a hill. Any hints you can pick up about oncoming traffic is useful having that information diluted by distant street lights of building floods is not.

[Dave Liquorice]

Skitts Law in action.

[James Wilkinson Sword]

I've never had to do that. Pulling half onto the pavement or a verge lets them past, as people the other side are doing the same.

Seeing oncoming traffic as it is, instead of just a blinding light is much better. You can more easily tell the size and speed of a moving object that doesn't have million candlepower bulbs aiming at our retinas.

[Dave Liquorice]

Pavement? Can't be using the American meaning as "pulling half onto the pavement" creats an obstruction.

Otherwise know as a ditch... if it exists at all before the drystone walls. It would be a narrow gap to do at speed, in an ambulance, with at most 50 yds visibilty before the next bend.

People? The ambulance was the only other traffic I'd seen for the previous 5 miles and saw the next 15...

street

Sheep, deer, hares, rabbits, phesants, etc don't have lights or particulary good retro reflectors. Main beam is required to see properly. The clean air means there is no scatter to see before hand.

[James Wilkinson Sword]

This is a UK group, so I used the UK meaning of pavement. It does not create an obstruction when I move my vehicle half off the road the ambulance is trying to use.

Then slow down before moving onto it.

Then you don't need to pull over, they can just overtake.

Main beam is required in the dark. Not in the light. TURN THEM OFF.

[Andrew]

As I suspected. One rule for company car users, and an entirely separate set of relaxed rules for motability. Unless the person on benefits cannot drive, surely it should be restricted to 'driver only' ?.

I once watched that program on C5 when the High Court Sheriffs were trying to recover a debt owed by a young lady to a funeral director. Apparently ladies mother had died of cancer. She really put on the whole drama queen entertainment, telling the debt collectors that they were scum of the earth blah, blah, blah, that she was 'suffering' from agrophobia and stress and on disability benefits, so had no assets.

According to lady the Sheriffs were 'picking' on her and her *wife* because were living in a rented house (quite new) which was all funded by housing benefit etc.

When they checked her car, it turned out to be a motability car.

They mused on camera, just what her disability was, since she had no problems giving them the 3rd degree on the doorstep.

A Ford garage near my fathers house in South Wales has a big sign in their showroom advertising the motability deals they do. Apparently that, plus PCP loans are their entire business.

[The Other Mike]

Except the no dismantling thing has been in the MOT handbook for a very long time knocking up 20 years to my knowledge and maybe 'forever'

Have a vehicle with undertrays that obscure the bottom of the engine, suspension parts and steering and the MOT document you get back makes specific mention of undertrays preventing inspection.

Back in 1999, with the first tests of the Lotus Elise some garages refused to test without removal of the undertrays either by the owner or as a chargeable item. After a number of complaints VOSA got involved and sanctioned testing of those vehicles and many others since without any removal requirements. Testers do not remove the undertrays, they only make an advisory note on the MOT documentation they provide after the test.

For example from one of my recent MOT's

engine covers obscuring testable items. undertrays fitted obscuring testable items.

Going back to the wheel, if they did remove them, then what torque setting would they use to reattach the wheels when the vehicle is not listed in any data handbook or the owner either refuses or is unable to provide that figure?

What about the situation where three eared knock on wheels are fitted and the application of a torque setting requires a specialist spanner adaptor that is not, nor ever will be in the toolkit of the MOT testing station. I'll admit that such vehicles will now fall outside the 40 year rule but there is nothing preventing an owner of any vehicle of any age submitting it for a test. That ranges from something from the 19th Century to one straight out of the showroom.

The public liability implications of removing parts to perform a safety test are huge.

I would suggest the "securely attached to the wheel hubs" requirement for brake discs is inherent untestable for virtually all vehicles except those with 'flat discs' and removable disc bells, and for those vehicles with that arrangement of they have cooling air scoops feeding the hub to disc gap there is zero visibilty of the fixings.

[Jethro_uk]

AS I said, SWMBO cannot drive (eyesight f***ed). She is in receipt of the benefit which provides a Motability car (plus a few thousand non- refundable "deposit" from us)

I take it that it was an in-depth, medically knowledgeable discussion, where all forms of disability and their manifestation were examined ?

Or (more likely) two blokes spouting bollocks. Funny, I bet there was no "balance" there. If only they'd linked it to climate change. We'd have had to have a full panel of "views".

For PIP/DLA recipients at the *highest* rate, it is possible to sign over the entire mobility component to Motability as a monthly payment on a lease car. A quick look at government data suggests a total of 157,000 people are getting this award. Or c. 0.25% of the entire population of the UK. Eliminating that benefit with no replacement wouldn't even equal a days worth of uncollected *due* tax from business.

It's also worth knowing that the plural of anecdote is not data.

[Andrew]

Thousands are in that situation, including Brian who posts here.

Are you saying that they all get a motability car for the rest of their family to benefit from ?.

A trip to Wilsons of Epsom is an eye-opener. Their forecourt is awash with 3-year old cars, and a great many 7 seater people carriers. All of them ex-motability, and few with an auto box. I think this indicates an unacceptable level of abuse, just like the infamous blue (free parking) badges.

[Andrew]

It was fly-on-the wall documentary and the two blokes were wearing body cams, so what we saw, was what they saw, heard and recorded. They checked for assets and asked their office to check the car for finance, and that was when it turned out to be a motability car, and having jusgt had a confrontation with the 'disabled' driver, quite rightly mused on the nature of her alledged disability.

You are beginning to sound suspiciously defensive of your and this ladies 'entitlement'. She was not in any way physically disabled, so why and how did she obtain a motability car ?.

If she she hadn't tried to avoid a funeral bill then she (and i suspect thousands more like her) would simply have stayed under the radar until someone dropped her in it to the benefits hotline.

[charles]

At our railway station there is a large poster - the message on it is "Not all disabilty is visble." For example: People, who look quite normal, can get very short of breath when walking any significant distance. People with only one leg look quite normal when wearing trousers. etc, etc

[RJH]

I think only two people can be insured.

And anyway, why not? It's a meagre compensation for a disability.

I'm sure we all have an anecdote or two - I certainly do. And it does annoy me when the non-disabled driver uses the car/badge to park in disabled spaces for themselves. Many a shouting match in my local Waitrose car park :-)

But to my mind, there's a greater good. Even if a few thousand abuse the system, many hundreds of thousands benefit, deservedly so.

[tabbypurr]

non-sequitur of course

I've seen one person who is disabled criticised for parking in a disabled bay. There's no shortage of people that think they know what they're talking about but don't.

NT

[Jethro_uk]

I have no idea. Just like you. You judgemental prick.

My wifes entitlement comes from filling out forms, providing copious evidence (100 pages of scans) and a formal interview with an assessor on behalf of the DWP.

Twice.

Mysteriously, an awful lot of "reports" to the authorities merely result in confirmation that any benefits were awarded correctly.

If you want to stop looking like you have a hidden agenda, I suggest you cast a glance over this

Benefit fraud: £1.2 billion (DWPs own figure) Tax avoidance: £30 billion (HMRCs own figure)

as it asks, where you *you* start ?

[whisky-dave]

Do you think you could beat jonnie peacock in a 100 metre race ?

which of you is disabled. ?

[Jethro_uk]

Benefits are awarded for disability, not condition.

Quite.

Usually, when we go shopping, I take the trolley to the car, to put the shopping in, while SWMBO looks at clothes, or other stuff.

So the world would see an apparently completely fit man, loading a car in a blue badge space. And then presumably go off and write about it on usenet.

[dennis]

8<

There are plenty of motability cars that don't require any additional upfront payments. Its just a lease hire scheme where the mobility payment makes up part/all of the costs.

Some disabled people are fine for days at a time and then suffer.

You can sign over less if you go for a cheaper(1) car, however there isn't much saving.

1: Cheaper is the cost over the lease and a cheap to buy car may cost more than one with a better resale value. Quite often a better spec model of a car is cheaper on motability.

The manufacturers also tend to throw in extras which make the resale value better.

[dennis]

What's auto got to do with it? The majority of disabled with motability cars probably can't drive them anyway.

Maybe we should just give then twice as much every week so they can use taxis? You don't get many taxi journeys out of ~£60 a week. It would cost me a fortune as I have been going to the hospital 3-4 times a week for three months. Maybe they should give me a car and save me money? Or maybe I can get patient transport. that would cost even more for the NHS.

[Jethro_uk]

The problem is when you start needing a bigger car because of wheelchairs and power scooters, the deposit goes up.

We've paid out over £9,000 in deposits since 1999.

It's incredibly annoying that the single most useful "adaptation" - an automatic gearbox - isn't the baseline spec for *all* motability cars.