Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of including a requirement to check whether a vehicle's number plate is a ghost plate during an MOT.

Vehicle registration plate checks are included within the MOT test. Registration plates are visually inspected to ensure they are legible, correctly displayed and comply with legal requirements, and non-compliant plates can result in an MOT failure.

The Department recognises concerns about vehicles using illegal or so-called "ghost" number plates and is working with the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA), the police and other partners to address this issue. We will continue to consider all appropriate measures as part of our wider work on illegal number plates.