Vehicle Registration Offences in 2021 & 2022

Freedom of information request reference no: 01.FOI.23.030758

I note you seek access to the following information:

How many offences and/or tickets were recorded in the years 2021 and 2022 for number plate (vehicle registration marks) mis-space and/or registrations which do not conform to legality?

How many reports for the years 2021 and 2022 were recorded for the cloning of vehicle registration marks?

Decision

I have today decided to disclose the located information to you in full.

Please find below information pursuant to your request above.

How many offences and/or tickets were recorded in the years 2021 and 2022 for number plate (vehicle registration marks) mis-space and/or registrations which do not conform to legality?

The offences referenced are not notifiable and are dealt with by way of Traffic Offence Reports.

The number of these issued per year, and by type, can be found below:

Traffic Offence	Number of TORS - 2021	Number of TORS - 2022
Drive vehicle no front registration plate	808	743
Keeping/driving vehicle without rear registration plate	180	254
Registration mark incorrectly displayed (format)	4224	3995
Registration mark obscured or not easily readable	757	747
Grand Total	5969	5739

How many reports for the years 2021 and 2022 were recorded for the cloning of vehicle registration marks?

Number plate/registration mark cloning is the act of either stealing or making copies of a person’s number plate and displaying it on a different vehicle, which is usually of the same make, model and colour as the original. The intent behind this act is generally to commit a crime or offence. Despite the fact that number plate cloning is almost always carried out with intent to break the law, the cloning itself is not recognised in the UK as a notifiable crime in itself and therefore information cannot be extracted from our crime reporting system regarding the number of offences. Therefore this information is not held.

The MPS can instead provide a count of Theft of Number plates (which is not cloning, and although we can guess it does not tell us with certainty what the plates might get used for or whether they were used for on another vehicle). If you would like this information, please submit a new request to [email protected]