Aftermarket December/January 2023

association that will lobby, represent and fight on their behalf. “Also, our professional licensing activity is thriving as employers recognise how important investing in training and development is to retaining their employees and currently more than 11,000 technicians have been trained, assessed as competent and issued with a professional licence under our REACT and Tyre Technician Professional Development schemes. As we look to the future, the Circular Economy, especially in relation to Green Tech also represents massive opportunities. Truck tyres, for example, are now designed to be re- treaded up to three times and the NTDA is 100% committed to promoting re-treading, because it makes absolutely undeniable sense to keep resources in use for as long as possible while also supporting skilled employment in this important sector of the trade. Who knows - we may even start to see the return of car tyre remoulding, which is already a growing sector in countries such as France.” Summing up Stefan said: “Let’s just hope that our government also starts to recognise the opportunities, gets a grip of its own levelling up plans and drives business growth – we certainly need it to.” Modernise Looking at the coming year from the garage equipment perspective, GEA Chief Executive Julian Woods said: “At the time of writing, UK parliament is in a major mess and inflation is rising at an uncontrollable rate along with energy prices. We are also approaching some of the deadline implemented during the Brexit negotiations for the transitional legislation changes we will need to work to as an independent country. This covers such things as the UKCA mark, the new UK replacement safety mark as we cannot use the EU CE safety mark any more. From 1 Jan 2023, all equipment manufactured/imported to the UK must be certified to the new UKCA safety mark, or for Northern Ireland UKNI mark. We will no longer be allowed to accept or sell CE branded equipment, unless it was manufactured and imported before 31 December 2022. “Potentially, some equipment manufacturers/importers may simply decide to not get their equipment tested to the new UK standard and thus stop supplying that equipment to the UK market. This could result in reducing choice. Alternatively, with the current exchange rate suppliers may simply have to increase costs to the UK market. Our industry has been doing a great job holding off some of the recent price rises incurred since Brexit and the pandemic; This could be swept away by new UK legislation. “On a more positive note, we anticipate that the DVSA will continue with its plans to modernise the MOT test with connected MOT equipment. During 2023 we expect to see the introduction of a connected electronic headlight testing unit within the MOT scheme and maybe even a number plate recognition system to help the busy MOT testers even further in doing a quality job.” IAAF Chief Executive Mark Field said: “When the new government came into power, Levelling Up Secretary Michael Gove said ‘boring is back’. For the automotive 12 AFTERMARKET DECEMBER/JANUARY 2023 BIG ISSUE Below: Access to data poses its own challenge www.aftermarketonline.net