MAG reported last February that EU Periodic Technical Inspections (PTI) for motorcycles seemed to have faded away.
It is very rare indeed for over 18 months to elapse between an EU public consultation closing and the subject to advance as a firm proposal from the Commission, so we felt able to contemplate that the Commission had gone off the idea, given that they were unable to provide any link between bike accidents and road worthiness testing.
Ten countries in Europe have no form of PTI (or MoT as we refer to it here) and yet there is no instance of increased injury due to un-roadworthy bikes when compared to those countries who do have regular inspections. The 10 countries are Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Ireland, Malta, the Netherlands, Cyprus and Portugal.
Given the problems the Commission is facing with its attempts to foist anti-tampering rules on motorcyclists without any proof, MAG mistakenly thought they would at least attempt to produce some justification for a euro-wide PTI. The power of the PTI lobby is great however and the private companies involved stand to make a fortune as the majority of the total bike fleet (35 million) in Europe is over 4 years old, the age at which the Commission propose testing should commence.
In the UK we already have the MoT of course, so British riders won’t be affected as profoundly as our European colleagues, but this new example of riders incurring extra charges for no obvious gain is worrying. The full proposal is expected to be made public tomorrow, Friday 13th…
If you have a moment, there is a good account of developments here
www.fema-online.eu/index.php?mact=News,cntnt01,detail,0&cntnt01articleid=301&cntnt01returnid=15
It’s good to see that FEMA have adopted our ‘Hands off bikes’ slogan, which is a perfect opportunity to say that T-shirts (in many sizes) are still available from www.euhandsoffbiking.co.uk for only £5. It seems they’ll be as relevant next year as this!