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CALLING THE REGISTER Len Fuller is right in one respect
Page 26
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in his Sound Off article ( CM1218 Sept) when he says that trailer registration won't stop trailer theft, Unfortunately much of the rest of his article is full of the flawed statistics that those in favour of trailer registration are so keen on bandying about.
Let us look at some of these. The 12,000 trailers reported stolen and not recovered last year is a threeyear-running total. In other words 12,000 trailers have been stolen over the past three years and not recovered.
He then uses this figure to 'prove' that theft of trailers in the UK is running at more than 6% of the trailer fleet. I cannot start to guess where he corgured up that figure.
The trailer fleet in UK is often quoted as 625,000, but this is the fleet of trailers over 1,020kg unladen weight—in other words those subject to operator licensing. The stolen trailer figure includes all reported trailers.
!have no doubt that in that figure there are many horse boxes, light trailers and pieces of mobile plant. I doubt if anybody knows how many trailers there are in total in the UK if we take all of these into account. But say we assume that all 12,000 of the missing trailers are over 1,020kg unladen weight, the rate of theft still comes out at 0.84%.
Registration will not stop trailer theft, as it has not stopped car or lorry theft, but one thing that Mr Fuller's firm and other trailer manufacturers could do to help the situation is to put clearly visible vehicle identification numbers on their trailers; something they have been reticent to do over the years. Gavle Scott,
Policy manager, 0-licensing and enforcement, Freight Transport Association.
• Len Fuller replies...
I understand the PA's desire to avoid further burdens on operators, both complications of operation and taxation.
Manufacturers have similar desires, but believe that trailer registration is coming with the need for UK manufacturers to comply with trailer type approval, The SMMT thought a more proactive approach tovrards the matter might help to ensure the best overall implementation Consideration has been given to how we may help to construct the simplest possible procedures for trailer registration, and what benefits may exist which may offset the extra work and costs Involvect One passible benefit we envisaged was reducing the recent
experience of escalating insurance premiums.
We know that theft statistical are poor and this includes insufficient division of data by vehicle size and type, but there is reason to believe there is real benefit in reducing theft, which depends on speed of identity.
The police like registration because it enables them to respond quickly, and in spite of obvious shortcomings it is the best system in existence and is recognised Internationally.
Vehicle Inspectorate In numbers are insufficiently insecure, and fail to identify owners. Most trailer manufacturers use VIN numbers, but these do not identify owners, and are subject to errors in speedy identification.
I hope we shall be able to help all parties minimise costs of trailer registration and perhaps pick up some benefits to other factors, such as safety.
Lan Fuller, Technical director, Andover Trailers.