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A report released earlier this year resulted in the recall of a number of Jaguar and Landrover models after it was found that they emitted more CO2 than was recorded in the official certification.

At a time when the group is struggling financially the recall, whilst expensive, was nothing like the costs and fines that were imposed on the VW Group. Did someone play down the findings to give Jaguar a chance to instigate the recall?

Here’s the report from the BBC:

Jaguar Land Rover is recalling 44,000 cars in the UK over carbon dioxide emissions, the car maker has said.

Regulators found 10 models were emitting more of the greenhouse gas than they had been certified to emit.

The car maker will contact owners to arrange repairs, a JLR spokeswoman said.

JLR is facing a number of challenges at the moment, including a slump in demand for diesel cars and a sales slowdown in China.

The firm said it was a voluntary recall of certain 2016-2019 MY Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles fitted with two litre diesel or petrol engines.

The affected models are:

Some two-litre 2016 to 2018 Land Rover Discovery and Discovery Sport cars

Certain two litre Range Rover Evoque, Sport, and Velar cars

Jaguar E-Pace, F-Pace, F-Type, XE and XF cars.

Most models are petrol, while some are diesel.

Some of the models will need physical repairs in a dealership, while some will need software updates, the spokeswoman said.

“The modifications made to affected vehicles will be made free of charge and every effort will be made to minimise inconvenience to the customer during the short time required for the work to be carried out,” the firm added.

In January the firm confirmed it is cutting 4,500 jobs, with the substantial majority coming from its 40,000 strong UK workforce.

The firm has complained about uncertainty caused by Brexit.

Emissions have come under more scrutiny since Volkswagen’s diesel scandal.

Investors are pursuing the German car giant for about €9.2bn (£8.2bn) in damages, claiming the company should have come clean sooner about falsifying emissions data. By Graham Hill

We all like to think that we will be able to continue driving until we decide that we no longer wish to. But with people living longer due to massive improvements in health care being alive doesn’t mean that you are medically fit to still drive.

According to official statistics released earlier this year more elderly drivers have had their licences revoked than ever before.

Data shows the number of drivers aged 70 or older banned from driving on medical grounds has increased by nearly 150 per cent

The number of drivers aged 70 or older banned from driving for medical reasons has increased by nearly 150 per cent in the space of a decade, according to new data.

Almost 22,500 elderly motorists had their licences revoked on medical grounds in 2018, according to DVLA (Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency) figures obtained by the Times via a Freedom of Information request.

Drivers should have an eye test every decade, urge experts

The data shows 61,482 car and motorbike licences – for drivers of all ages – were revoked for medical reasons last year – an increase of 116.8 per cent since 2010.

Yet over the same period, the number of drivers aged 70 and over having their licences revoked on medical grounds shot up by 142 per cent, from 9,265 in 2010, to 22,453 in 2018.

Two-thirds of 70+year-olds currently hold a driving licence, up from 39 per cent in the mid-1990s. The issue of elderly drivers holding licences was thrown into sharp relief back in January, when Prince Philip’s Land Rover Freelander collided with a Kia near the Queen’s private home at Sandringham in Norfolk.

A spokesperson for road safety charity Brake told the Times that regulation around drivers’ fitness to drive should be “more rigorously enforced” via means such as compulsory eyesight tests.

AA president Edmund King echoed this sentiment, calling for evidence of regular eye tests for elderly drivers and stricter guidance from GPs.

Caroline Abrahams, charity director of Age UK, disagreed though and pointed out that older drivers are, on average, less likely to have an accident than younger drivers.

Meanwhile, the Department for Transport said the issue of older drivers would be addressed in a “refreshed road safety statement” later in the year.”

Thanks to Auto Express – By Graham Hill

Auto Express have carried out some surveys amongst their readers into satisfaction levels achieved by Insurance Companies and Breakdown Services.

The winner of the insurance top place was a surprise to me, is not available on the comparison sites but has won for the fourth time in a row. The top breakdown service was also a surprise to me but as the report shows it’s the 7^th year in a row for this one.

To see the full survey buy a copy of Auto Express or look it up online. The insurance survey asked 7 questions:

Ease of purchase (web & phone)

Telephone experience when making a claim

Keeping you informed when claim is being assessed

Speed to settle a claim

Friendliness and helpfulness during claim

Value for money

Overall satisfaction with claim process

The top 5 insurers were as follows:

1. The National Farmers Union Mutual (NFU Mutual) – available to everyone
2. RIAS (up 9 places)
3. Privilege (Part of Direct Line)
4. LV= (Formerly Liverpool Victoria)
5. Quote Me Happy.Com (Budget arm of Aviva)

I would add one to avoid – Zurich which didn’t even appear in the top 50. They refused a payout when I made a claim and it took two and a half years to finally get the Financial Ombudsman to find in my favour after an adjudicator had constantly told them to pay out – avoid like the plague!

Moving on to the top breakdown services. There are 190,000 breakdowns each year according to Highways England so seen as a must have for most motorists. Auto Express listed 25 top providers which you can see in the full report but for your information, I’ve shown the top 5. First of all the list of questions asked:

Ease of purchase

Keeping you informed

Speed of recovery

Ability to fix the fault

Friendliness and helpfulness

General presentation

Value for money

The top 5 breakdown services were as follows:

1. GEM Motoring Assist (7^th year in a row)
2. Green Flag (best at keeping customers informed)
3. LV= Britannia Rescue (LV owned Britannia carried out most roadside repairs)
4. AutoAid
5. AA (largest UK provider)

Just out of interest the RAC was next after the AA.

So there you have it – By Graham Hill

As we move towards the winter months when poor weather can lead to problems with grip it raises the question as to which end of the car should you fit the new tyres?

I addressed this problem earlier this year but it might be worth reminding you what was said at the time. You may think this is a daft question – simply replace the tyres that are worn – right?

Front tyres generally wear out quicker than rears if your car is front wheel drive and rears wear quicker if rear wheel drive, so wouldn’t it be correct to replace the tyres that wear fastest with the new boots? No!

Most safety experts ignore the wear element or whether the car is front, rear or all wheel drive and suggest that you always put freshest tyres on the rear of the car. This is because if the car loses grip in a corner, it will either oversteer or understeer.

Unless you are an F1 fan you may not understand what this means. Understeer is when the front tyres lose grip in a corner causing the front of the car to slide out whilst oversteer means you lose grip at the back of the car, causing the rear of the car to swing out.

It’s actually easier to control a car that is understeering than one that is oversteering – simply slowing down should help to regain grip if the car is understeering.

This is why it is important that you should maintain the greatest grip at the rear and fit your new tyres at the rear of the car. This will minimise the chance of potential oversteer and minimise the chance of a serious accident. Great advice eh! Graham Hill

Drivers in the UK have spent more than £3m buying International Driving Permits since February in preparation for a no deal Brexit.

UK motorists have bought 584,000 International Driving Permits (IDPs) since February 2019 in order to still be able to drive in Europe following a no deal Brexit.

This means drivers have spent in excess of £3.2 million on them in the last six months, according to figures revealed by transport minister Michael Ellis in response to a written Parliamentary question.

Previously, IDPs were available from 89 Post Office branches, as well as from the RAC and AA. Around 100,000 were issued each year to British motorists looking to drive outside Europe. In February, though, the rules were changed so that IDPs were only available from 2,500 Post Office branches and nowhere else.

The Government issued advice to drivers saying UK driving licences may no longer be valid in EU and EEA countries following a no-deal Brexit, which could have occurred on 29th March or 12th April 2019, before the deadline was moved to 31st October

This led to a spike in demand for IDPs, with 282,000 applications in March and 163,000 in April. A number of Post Offices saw long queues, prompting a House of Lords report to call for IDPs to be available online.

Nicholas Lyes, head of roads policy at the RAC, commented: “It’s truly astonishing that more than half a million International Driving Permits have been issued since the Government took the service in-house. In one month alone, the number of IDPs issued was almost three times higher than the amount normally issued in an entire year.

“This shows that people who were planning to take their vehicles abroad most definitely heeded warnings about being ready to drive in the EU in the event of a no-deal Brexit. During the Spring, this led to long queues and even shortages of IDPs at some Post Offices.

“As we head towards the next Brexit deadline of 31st October 2019, it is vital that Post Offices are set up to cope with a sudden surge in IDP requests so that drivers are not confronted with frustrating pre-holiday delays. However, much of this will be dependent on the terms of the UK’s departure from the EU.” By Graham Hill Thanks To Auto Express

Having been diagnosed Type 2 Diabetes earlier this year I checked to see if I should report the condition to the DVLA or my insurance company. I’m pleased to say that thanks to a change in diet, sadly the removal(ish) of chocolate, increased exercise and medication I’m now nearly back to the safe level. However, if you have type 2 diabetes it is a reportable condition. Certainly, if you are taking Insulin.

According to the DVLA website you need to take advice from your GP as other medication is questionable. If it affects your driving then it should be reported. Remember if you have any medical condition that could affect your driving it should be reported to the DVLA as well as your insurer. If you don’t do it you can be fined up to £1,000 by not reporting to the DVLA and if you don’t report to the condition to your Insurer and make a claim they could refuse to pay out.

Here is a list of conditions that are reportable:

Notifiable conditions are anything that could affect your ability to drive safely. They can include:

diabetes or taking insulin

syncope (fainting)

heart conditions (including atrial fibrillation and pacemakers)

sleep apnoea

epilepsy

strokes

glaucoma

If you are unsure about a particular condition take advice from your GP. If you feel that you have a reportable condition you can complete a form online for submission. Go to:

https://www.gov.uk/driving-medical-conditions

By Graham Hill

In last night’s edition of Rip-Off Britain, we followed a police team as they stopped cars without insurance. A number recognition camera mounted in the back of a police van identified vehicles without insurance and when found would alert a policeman down the road who would pull over the driver.

Without insurance, drivers were issued a ticket with a fixed penalty along with 6 points on their licence. Then to add to the pain the car was immediately uplifted and taken to the police compound resulting in additional charges.

I had no sympathy for those with no insurance but they found drivers who had purchased insurance online only to find that even though they could show that they had a certificate and proof of payment out of their bank account they had their cars impounded and ended up in court. One driver who had been scammed received a fine and points on his licence for not having a licence even though he was paying monthly, hade a certificate and policy, both of which looked fine but were fakes.

The police warned about the scams. In it’s most simple form the scammers advertised on Social Media offering insurance at 75% off (that would never happen) and only a mobile phone number as a contact point. You would receive a policy and certificate – all fake. The scammer will normally want the whole premium upfront although the man in the programme was paying £120 monthly.

The next scam was an actual broker providing a genuine policy and certificate but with all your details changed. It would show a different address, age, no claims bonus etc. When all added up it would cause the rate to drop substantially with the scammer pocketing the difference in premium. The scammer will normally expect all the premium upfront.

The last scam would result in you receiving your policy and certificate from a broker but the broker then cancels the policy without the knowledge of the driver and receives the refund of the insurance premium. Again the broker will ask for the whole of the premium upfront.

If you want to check to see if your car is insured click on the link and enter your registration number: https://ownvehicle.askmid.com/#  By Graham Hill

Every year for the last 20 years Auto Express carry out tests on various car care products and award the best with their Product Award. They take account of price, ease of use, performance etc. I thought it would be handy to list their top award winners so far this year. For more details, you can search for Auto Express Best Products. In the meantime here are the best products:

Car Washes: Halfords Car Wash & Wax, cost £2 for 1 litre. Whilst this was the cheapest tested it wasn’t this that caused it to win. You use a little more than other brands but it is much cheaper.

Clay Bars: Bilt-Hamber Auto Clay Regular, cost £9.95 for 200g Clay bars cut through contaminants that bond to the painted surface of a car. This was one of the best priced and the best performer.

Polishes: Angelwax Perfect Polish, cost £9.95 for 500ml. This one saw off some of the more popular brands such as Simoniz, Autoglym an Autobrite. There was little to choose between Autobrite and Angelwax so in the end it was down to price with Angelwax edging it.

Waterless Cleaners: Meguiar’s Waterless Wash And Wax Anywhere, cost £16 for 768ml. Strangely liked for its smell as well as its performance simply spray, wipe then buff and admire the shine. The shine was also the longest lasting.

Waxes and Sealants: Bilt-Hamber Double Speed-Wax, £14.95 for 250ml. Apparently, you can pay up to £50 for a carnauba paste(which is what this is) so great value for money. 24 were tested over 9 weeks with this one coming out on top.

Wheel Cleaners: Bilt-Hamber Auto-Wheel, cost £12.99 for 1litre. In this case the smell was horrendous – eggy in nature. However, the cost and the efficiency of the product made it to the top of the list of 19 tested.

Wheel Wax & Sealants: Wonder Wheels Wheel Sealant, cost £6.50 for 300ml. Best performance and best price this product takes time because you need to properly clean the alloys before applying and it takes time for the product to cure – but well worth the wait apparently.

Tyre Shine: CarPlan TyreSlik, £4.10 for 500ml. This is uniquely the only product tested by Auto Express that has remained in the number 1 position since testing began 20 years ago. Well done!

Upholstery Cleaner: Simoniz Upholstery & Carpet Cleaner, cost £3.18 for 500ml. This was one of the only foam cleaners with a brush fitted to the can. Most others were trigger applicators but none performed as well as this cleaner and low cost.

Screenwashes: Prestone Extreme Performance Screen Wash, cost £3.50 for 2litres. This wash, ready made up was great value for money, cleaned the screen well and won in both categories, winter and summer with the summer version cheaper than the competition.

Headlamp Bulbs: Philips Racing Vision, cost £25.99 for a pair. By far the best bulbs out of 20 tested, brightest and topped all but one of the various tests.

Sat Navs: Tom Tom Go, cost One Year’s Subscription £14.99. In this category they tested both sat-nav units and mobile phone apps with this app being the winner. They’ve stuffed many of the features of their top navs into the app.

Dash Cams: Nextbase 612 GW, cost £249.99. The cam has a radius of 150 degrees and records in 4K Ultra HD. The camera picked up pedestrians in the dark and could read number plates from afar. A polarised filter sits on top of the lens making the colours sharper. Given the quality it offers very good value for money.

Tyres: Continental Premium Contact 6, cost £93.20. Wet or dry this car came out on top, sharing the top spot with Michelin in the dry but by far the best in the wet with no other car coming close. All round a very good tyre.

Winter Tyres: Continental Winter Contact TS860, cost £117.22. Not the best in the snow but in the wet that dominates British winters it was streets above the competition. Changing tyres between summer and winter is still not popular but for those that need to change tyres they refer to this tyre as a Truly Remarkable Tyre.

All Season Tyres: Continental All Season Contact, cost £120.64. Out of all the tyres tested this tyre came either first or second in every test making it by far the best all season tyre even after Continental had said that you either changed tyres between summer and winter or put up with a compromise. This is their first attempt at an all season tyre.

Many thanks to Auto Express – By Graham Hill

According to Auto Express, the DfT has started the rollout of E5 and B7 labels indicating ethanol and biofuel content of petrol and diesel. Signs will be mandatory by 1 September

The Department for Transport (DfT) is rolling out a new set of labels for petrol and diesel pumps at filling stations across the UK, with unleaded petrol to be renamed E5, and diesel labelled as B7. E10 petrol is likely to follow at a later date.

The names relate to the percentage of ethanol and biofuel present in petrol and diesel respectively, and are intended to make motorists “think more carefully about the environmental impacts of their journeys” and “educate drivers on the benefits of biofuels.” The majority of unleaded sold in the UK must contain up to five per cent ethanol under the Government’s Renewable Transport Fuels Obligation, though no such requirements are in place for super-unleaded.

The new labels are being rolled out immediately, and garages will be legally required to display them by September 2019. As well as the mandated E5 label, petrol stations will have to clearly show the biofuel content of the diesel fuel being sold, with diesel comprised of seven per cent biofuel clearly labelled as ‘B7’.

Biofuels are typically comprised of a blend of oil and plant or animal fat fuel, with the UK’s biodiesel comprised of oilseed rape, sugar beet and wheat. Figures from 2016 show 132,000 hectares of land in the UK was used to grow crops for bioenergy.

The move towards E5 and B7 labels is likely to herald the arrival of E10 petrol, which contains up to 10 per cent bioethanol and is claimed to bring about a two per cent reduction in CO2. The Government launched a consultation into E10 petrol in 2018, but motoring organisations have warned as many as 800,000 cars can’t use E10, and a second response to the consultation is due later this year.

Commenting on the new labels, Transport Minister Michael Ellis said: “Biofuels are a key way of achieving the emissions reductions the UK needs, and their use reduced CO2 emissions by 2.7 million tonnes last year alone – the equivalent of taking around 1.2 million cars off the road.” By Graham Hill

Many moons ago my dad bought a brand new Cortina and one of the options at the time was electric front windows. I asked if he was going to have the option as it looked pretty cool and his answer was – why? What problem did electric windows address? And besides which it was something else to go wrong.

Hand-cranked windows rarely went wrong and if they did a sharp bang on the inside of the door seemed to sort it out. So when you read daily of car crime increasing because of crooks being able to break into keyless car technology and nick cars and contents on an industrial scale I find myself asking the question – why? Why does the technology even exist?

What problem does keyless entry solve? I understand remote controls, one of the best things ever invented for TV’s and cars. With respect to cars, you no longer have to fumble in the dark to find a hole in which to stuff your key or breath on the door lock to defrost it enough to insert the key and gain entry on a frosty morning.

No more fumbling in the rain and with some diesels, remotely unlocking the car from a distance actually activates the pre-heaters which should be activated before starting the engine. So why this obsession with keyless entry? What is the problem it is solving over and above a remote key.

A remote key is capable of transmitting around a trillion variants of its generated code that allows the car to be locked/unlocked/boot opened etc. The only time the code can be accessed is when you push the button to transmit which is then changed the next time you lock or unlock the car making it incredibly difficult to break into the car.

On the other hand, a keyless device is transmitting constantly making it easy for crooks to harvest the code and unlock then start the car using a handheld computer device to gain entry. The fact is that it isn’t like my iPhone with either fingerprint or facial recognition you need to carry something so why not a remote key?

Personally, I don’t think my life will be in any way enhanced by having keyless entry so with a higher risk of theft and no doubt higher insurance premiums give me a remote control. My Audi is even more dopey. I have a remote control to open and lock the car and boot but when I’m in the car I have to press a button to start it with the remote control taking up space in one of my cup holders. Crazy!

In order to overcome the security issues faced by those with keyless entry I’ve scanned the solutions introduced by manufacturers and found that most either overcome the problem by using a Faraday bag that encases the signal or the remote can either be deactivated (a bit like pressing a button on a remote control) or it will deactivate itself if there is no movement. My solution is much easier, revert back to remote controls!

If you are concerned about keyless entry with your car some manufacturers have allowed for the keyless entry to be disenabled either yourself or by a main-dealer. Call their customer services or call into a dealer to find out. By Graham Hill