There are some weasle words about "keeping the policy under review" in the DVLA Q&A (can't find the link now) and I'll bet this is one area. The problem is its wide open to abuse - not some much with a Series as its harder to hide defects and not with the high end Mercs, Ferraris but the mid ground - Capris, MGBs,or Porshes with crash damage (most?) where you could take a basket case and with a bit of filler dress it up for a tidy profit. I think the separate chassis vehicles like a Series are less suseptible, its the unibodies with stressed sills and floors where the risk and big money is for concealing poor repairs. Over the years I've known people buy a Datsun that was blue in the front footwells and red in the back, an MGB with a floor made of laminated card and bitumin and something where the welded structural repairs were held on with silicone mastic shaped to look like welds. All three got impounded at MOTs, but here's the rub, they were all bought with MOTs, then failed after 12 months of driving. My series had 12 months MOT with 3 radials and one crossply (noticed later that owner and MOT mech shared a surname - who am I to say..) and a Triumph Herald from a garage "we've just MOTed it sir.." that broke its chassis 6 months later (but it was cheap...) its always gone on but now its just become easier if the buyer is naive. There is a silver lining to this, I had to get my series with an MOT so I could drive it home and park it on the road while I fixed it even though it was obvious it needed serious repairs (again it was cheap..). Now it looks like you could park a tax and MOT exempt basket job in the road so long as it had reflectors, no sharp edges and 3rd party cover (without cover for driving, if you can still get this).
