Overview
- The Motor Insurers' Bureau, which reported Friday that police seized about 160,000 uninsured cars last year, said this was the highest total in 17 years.
- The bureau estimates roughly 300,000 vehicles are driven without insurance each day, adding about £1 billion a year in costs to victims, services and the wider economy.
- Police and the MIB created Operation Scalis to target offenders, with West Midlands officers seizing 16 uninsured cars in Birmingham earlier this month including a Lamborghini.
- Hotspots identified by the MIB include five Birmingham postcodes — B25, B18, B66, B21 and B35 — along with RM19 in Thurrock, PE1 in Peterborough, M18 in Manchester, RM1 in Havering and BT17 in Belfast.
- Typical penalties are a £300 fine and six points, though many drivers cite unaffordable premiums and some resort to fronting by misnaming the main driver to cut costs.