In practice that's how I've always looked at it but Mark's point that the bike needs to be legal in your home country to be legally used in another country is also something I understood as well. Quite where that understanding came from I'm not sure though. It may be something that was agreed between European countries pre EU or maybe it forms some part of the various international transport treaties that international driving licences for example are the visible face of, or it may be something else totally. In reality though nobody is going to delve that deeply even if it does apply.

This comes up most often not so much with insurance but with MOT's if you're out of the country for more than a year. There's no (easy / cheap - I suppose you could always fly the bike back once a year for an MOT ) way round it and everybody takes a pragmatic approach (ie don't bother).

I understand what you are saying, but the "legality" of being able to operate the motorcycle in your home country (in this case the UK) addresses the question of whether or not the moto is roadworthy (i.e. has proper lighting, functional brakes, etc.) and also whether it is properly registered in the home country.

I think it is safe to assume that in Tom's case, both of the above requirements have been met.

The question of whether or not to keep up the annual licence plate fees when the moto is out of the home country is one that has come up before. It is a gray area.

My opinion (strictly an opinion, I'm not a lawyer) is that it is not necessary for me to keep my Canadian licence plate sticker, which is proof that the annual fee has been paid, current if I have the bike in Africa or Europe. The sticker is a tax that is paid to use the roads in Canada, and I'm not using those roads. Even if the sticker is expired, the motorcycle is still registered to me in Canada, hence, the ownership document is still 100% valid, as would be the case if the moto was in Canada but didn't have a current sticker (be aware that in North America, there are no regulations such as the SORN regulations you have in the UK).

But having said that, if I was in the USA, I would want to make sure that I kept the licence plate sticker current, simply because all the American states use a similar annual sticker system, and if I was stopped by a policeman for any reason, they would likely notice that the sticker was out of date. Whether they would - or even could - charge me with an offense I do not know, but it's not the kind of potential headache I would want to expose myself to. Additionally, because my Canadian insurance policy also covers me whilst I am in the USA, the question arises about whether the insurance would be valid if the annual licence plate renewal fee had not been paid.

But, in Europe or Africa, it's a whole different story. No police officer there will be familiar with Canadian road tax regulations. Any Canadian insurance that I might have on the motorcycle would not be valid in Europe or Africa. As long as I have an official registration document showing that I own the bike and that the licence plate number on the back of the bike matches the registration document, and as long as I have insurance that is valid in the country I am riding in, I have met all the requirements.

It might be worthwhile for Tom to keep his UK registration fees paid up whilst he is in Western Europe, simply because the authorities in nearby countries such as France, Spain, Germany, etc. might be familiar with UK registration and tax practices, as soon as he gets into Eastern Europe / Turkey / Africa, I don't think he needs to worry about that.

If a UK motorcycle carries some kind of sticker or tax disk with an expiry date on it, it would be prudent for him to remove it once that sticker or disk becomes out of date. That is what I did with the out of date sticker on my Canadian licence plate - I just took a hair dryer to it and removed the expired sticker. Now my licence plate looks like any other European plate = no renewal sticker on it.

Michael

There's nothing at all on UK bikes these days that visually signifies legality or lack of. There used to be 'tax discs' - small round paper discs - that you had to display to show you'd paid the annual 'road fund licence' and you couldn't get those unless you could show evidence of current insurance and having passed the annual safety inspection (MOT), but the discs were scrapped about 10yrs ago. You still have to do that stuff but these days your compliance is checked via a combination of computer records and number plate checking. It's assumed that every vehicle will be legal every year unless you declare otherwise - by registering it as off the road (SORN).

So in practice in Africa there's no way of checking the current roadworthiness status of a UK vehicle unless the authorities there can somehow access UK records - and let's face it, that's never going to happen. It comes down mostly to a matter of conscience I suppose but pragmatism rules there for most of us as well.

To date you up, Michael:
European plates only have one thing in common which is a blue area with 12 yellow stars on the left side showing the country code.

For mandatory other informations what has to shown on the plate every european country has got it`s own laws. Quite common are informations about:

- district/town of regulatory authority stickers proofs value of paid tax
- vehicle inspection sticker proofs verhicle is regulary checked for safety by authority.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vehicl...ates_of_Europe

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