High rate of MOT failures

Only in Cookstown with a failure rate of 27.54 per cent did more cars fail. The Northern Ireland average was 27.54 per cent.

Figures released by the Environment Minister Alex Attwood revealed the rate of increase in failure rates across all of Northern Ireland’s MOT centres between 2004/5 and last year.

At five centres the failure rate has increased with Londonderry one of these. The Newbuildings failure rate increased by 1.12 percentage points from 23.19 per cent to 25.03 per cent.

The Minister stated: “It should be noted that fail rates can change over time for a variety of reasons. For example, there may be changes in the composition of the stock of vehicles being presented for tests eg a test centre where the proportion of heavy goods vehicles (HGVs) being presented for testing has increased is likely to see a reduction in the overall pass rate.”