Transport Minister Austin Gatt has directed the Transport Authority to amend its policies and practices with regard to the temporary admission of foreign registered vehicles .

He said in a letter to the chairman after an audit of current processes by PricewaterhouseCoopers that the legal notice regulating this area should be amended so that:

A resident in Malta would not be given a temporary permit to import a foreign registered vehicle. Instead, any resident should be obliged to register the vehicle and pay the relative registration tax, within seven days of importation. Dr Gatt said he saw no reason for any exceptions to this rule, including second hand car importers.

He said a person should be considered as being a resident of Malta if he holds a Malta ID card or, according to law, should have applied for one.

Persons considered as being non-resident should have the right to import a foreign registered vehicle and keep it for six months, after which he/she would be obliged to register the vehicle and pay registration tax. However when this person produces a contract of employment showing that he/she is employed in Malta for a further period of six months at most, the ADT can extend the period of non-registration of the vehicle for a further six months which cannot be renewed.

Dr Gatt said vehicles exempt from registration should be issued with plates bearing distinctive letters or a security windscreen sticker showing that the car has been exempt and including the month of expiry of that permission.

The authority was also asked to establish the relevant fees and fines.