Registering old vehicles as vintage will be optional

Earlier today, the Senate held a hearing regarding the Vintage Vehicles Regulation Act. While the bill itself received support from the Senate and the House of Representatives, Assistant Secretary Edgar Galvante of the Land Transportation Office (LTO) did suggest increasing the minimum years a vintage vehicle can be registered.

Galvante argued that there are still old vehicles in the country that are used as dailies by motorists. Should they be classified as vintage, owners will only be limited to using them during weekends and holidays. In order to avoid this conundrum, he said that the minimum age of cars that can be registered as vintage must be older than 30 years.

However, this has resulted in another question - do all ‘old’ vehicles have to be registered as vintage? According to Congressman Paul Ruiz Daza of the 1st District of Northern Samar, it will not be mandatory.

Daza, one of the principal authors of House Bill No. 9884, confirmed during today’s Senate hearing regarding the Vintage Vehicles Regulation Act that registering vintage vehicles will not be mandatory.

“Just to clarify, cars that are 40-years old, 35-years old, or any [old] car for that matter, they’re not required to be registered as vintage. They can just go to regular annual registration. We won’t be displacing anyone. But if you think you have a vintage or classic car and you’re willing to use it on weekends and holidays, then you can register it as a vintage vehicle,” said Daza.

Daza reiterated that registering vintage cars will be presented as an option to the owner of the vehicle. He added that people who are using their older cars can keep on using them and registering them the way they are doing now.

While owners of older vehicles see this as a win-win situation, there is a provision in the said bill that will exempt vintage vehicles from modern standard safety laws that were passed after the car was built. This means owners that register their vehicles as vintage will be exempted from emissions and safety-related standards that were not yet available at the time their vehicles were made. However, owners can choose to modify their vehicles (e.g. retrofit seatbelts) to meet newer safety standards.

Should the Vintage Vehicles Regulations Act become law, would you rather keep your classic car as stock as possible, or would you modify it to meet modern safety standards? Remember, the latter will supposedly allow you to use it every day instead of weekends/holidays. Share your comments below.