Police on the lookout for unlicenced and unregistered drivers

ACT Policing is urging motorists to ensure their licence and registration details are up to date before hitting the road this festive season.

In addition to a focus on drink and drug driving, Police will also be on the lookout for unregistered and unlicenced motorists this December and January.

Between January and October this year, ACT Policing handed out 1056 fines to drivers of unregistered vehicles – almost twice as many as the whole of 2019 – as well as 1052 fines to unlicenced drivers.

Officer in Charge of Road Policing Detective Acting Inspector Ivan Naspe said with so many people jumping back in the car after a COVID break, Canberrans needed to make sure all their details were still up to date.

“You might forget about your rego or licence but I can guarantee police won’t,” Detective Acting Inspector Ivan Naspe said.

“COVID-19 and more working from home means many Canberrans may not have been out on the roads as much this year.

“Just because you aren’t using your car everyday doesn’t mean you can let your registration or licence expire.

“With Canberrans unable to head overseas this Christmas we anticipate more people out on the roads over the Christmas break.

“While Christmas is a time of giving, police don’t want to be handing out fines for unregistered vehicles or unlicensed drivers so make sure all your registration and licence details are up to date before you hit the road these holidays.”

ACT Policing recently added the state-of-the art Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) technology to a police motorcycle in an Australian first trial making it even harder for unregistered drivers to evade detection.

The ANPR system is capable of instantly scanning multiple number plates at a time with a full 360 degree field of vision with police aiming to equip all bikes with the multi-camera detecting technology in the future.

Driving an unregistered vehicle or without a valid licence will earn you a $675 fine.  If your vehicle has been unregistered for two weeks or more it is ineligible for insurance coverage attracting an additional fine of $924.

In December more than 38,300 vehicle registrations and 4,600 driver licences will come up for renewal in the ACT.

Renewing your vehicle’s registration or your driver licence has never been easier and can be done online with Access Canberra.

Many Canberrans may not know that driver licences can be renewed for five years quickly and simply online, without the need for a new photo to be taken (your photo is now valid for 11 years).

You can also do more than 450 services and transactions online with Access Canberra, so save yourself a visit to a Service Centre this festive season and jump on the Access Canberra website.

Media enquiries

Police Media — (02) 5126 9070, act-police-media@afp.gov.au

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