National Alignment of Vehicle Modification Legislation

(New South Wales State Pre-Election Commitment)

23 March 2019

We have forwarded the email below, to all New South Wales political parties who are registered with Australia Electoral Commission (NSW), for the New South Wales state election on 23 March 2019:

Pre-Election Commitment for National Alignment of Vehicle Modification Legislation

Dear NSW Political Parties et el,

On behalf of the aftermarket modified motoring community, we are dissatisfied that every state and territory government has different legislation, standards, processes, and regulations regarding modifications for in-service motor vehicles.

It has taken over 10 years for state governments to jointly develop the National Code of Practice (NCOP) for vehicle modifications, and even after this amount of time, no two states have the same modification and certification standards and processes.

It is unacceptable that vehicles which have undertaken modifications in one state jurisdiction, and have passed testing and engineering certification requirements by qualified auto-mechanical engineers and approved persons or signatories, cannot be sold or transferred into other state jurisdictions, without having to be fully engineered and re-certified in the new state.

Therefore, we request your state political party provides a pre-election commitment to support the “Time To Align” campaign at: https://www.timetoalign.org.au and allow vehicle modification standards to be managed at the federal level, in parallel to ADRs. The recommended federal solution references the NSW Vehicle Safety Compliance Certification Scheme (VSCCS) and associated processes as the basis for a national modification framework.

Australia no longer has a new vehicle manufacturing industry, and misaligned legislation / standards / processes across state borders does nothing to help the aftermarket industry and general consumers. We would like to see a national motoring cooperative established federally (representing all motoring communities / genres) stating their requirements to industry, who use their aftermarket associations / engineering affiliations to filter the requirements and document how they could be implemented using safe / practical / affordable processes, which leads to modification standards, which are then ratified by federal government, for all states to follow. This way, we have a consumer driven, industry validated process to support the aftermarket industry.

We request your party provide a pre-election commitment to:

• Acknowledge disparity in vehicle modification standards and processes across all state and territory jurisdictions;
• Pledge to move towards a federally managed vehicle modification set of standards and processes, as recommended in the “Time To Align” campaign;
• Accept a national working group involving the federal government, automotive industry, motoring communities, as equal co-chairs / lead appointments, to guide and manage the ongoing development of a National Vehicle Modification Framework; and
• Help establish a national approval and certification scheme for all automotive engineers, approved persons, vehicle inspectors, and technical workshops.

Federal Political Parties who have already made formal pre-election commitments to a National Vehicle Modification Framework for the 2019 election (and their written responses) are located at: https://www.timetoalign.org.au/federal-party-responses/

Disparate vehicle standards are disruptive to the Australian general population, motoring industry, motoring communities and generates an unnecessary level of bureaucracy, with many people losing faith in the necessity of state and territory governments.

It is time we truly align these standards at the federal level, for the benefit of all motoring Australians.

View All NSW Pre-Election Party Responses