Brennan’s car test policy is way out of focus

I TOOK my wife’s car for the NCT in South Dublin recently. I was dreading it since the new rule that a car should be failed if its lights were out of alignment, according to the testing computer and a repeat test would require a further fee €27.20.

The recommendation two years ago was that the lights were too low; now they failed because they were too high. When I first heard of the lights failing the NCT I suspected that this was a money racket - the invention of a government suffering from squandermania. Did Transport Minister Seamus Brennan introduce it to fund the gigantic overspend on the construction of roads?

The whole country, from Malin to Mizen, is being subjected to this penal tax. Is the motorist not being hammered enough in purchase taxes, road taxes, taxes on fuel, insurance, and so on?