Thursday, 12 May 2005

Adams closes door on shoddy car repairs

United Future's Paul Adams took a step this week to save New Zealand motorists from being taken for a ride.

The former national rally driving champion and Auckland motor trader successfully pushed for the removal of clause 67 from the Statutes Amendment Bill that would have quietly allowed insurance companies that are also motor traders to sell damaged but registered cars to the wrecking industry without having to provide a SIN (suppliers information notice).

"The whole issue of SIN cards is a major concern to motor traders," Mr Adams said, adding that he wanted it looked at in the coming review of the motor traders legislation.

"However for insurance companies to want to on-sell cars that they are prepared to write-off, and sell them without having to de-register them, just opens the door to the shoddy car repair industry and United Future believes this is totally unacceptable," he said.

All genuine motor traders want is a level playing field, he said.

"An imported car with even minor damage is flagged on the wharf as 'damaged'. This means that repairs will be supervised and done to an acceptable standard before it can be registered and driven on New Zealand roads.

"Yet here we were paving a way for cars to be written-off in New Zealand and then be able to go through a perhaps shoddy repair process without any flagging or any checks.

"The public would not accept this and neither would United Future," Mr Adams said in adding that he was delighted to have successfully engineered the clause out of existence.

ENDS

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