Vauxhall today is calling for the establishment of a national vehicle fire database.

Vauxhall today is calling for the establishment of a national vehicle fire database.

Speaking to the Transport Select Committee this afternoon, Vauxhall representatives called on Government to help the automotive industry gain access to information about vehicle fires held by insurers.

Encouragingly, Vauxhall understands that the Association of British Insurers (ABI) has written to the Transport Select Committee to say that, in principle, it supports the proposal.

Vauxhall believes that by accessing information from insurers, manufacturers may be able to identify potential issues earlier than at present.

Estimates for the number of vehicle fires vary widely, ranging from 18,000 per year (Auto Express) to 100,000 per year (fireservice.co.uk).

By collecting data from insurers it will be possible to gain a much more accurate picture of the number of fire cases and how they relate to specific models.

Whilst the data will not reveal the causes of fire, it can nevertheless play an invaluable role in alerting manufacturers to potential issues much earlier than is possible at present.

As Vauxhall’s experience with Zafira B shows, manufacturers have limited visibility of fires in their vehicles. Many Zafira B fire cases, for example, were reported to Vauxhall several years after they took place and only as a result of publicity in October 2015.

Vauxhall also told the committee about the challenges manufacturers face in completing safety recalls. For example, whilst 166,000 UK-registered Zafira Bs have now had their second and final fix, 55,000 have not had the work done, despite owners receiving up to seven letters.

These include thousands of vehicles without an MOT and thousands more ‘sold to trade’. Vauxhall is doing everything it can to reach the remaining vehicles, including co-operating with the AA and RAC to gain access to alternative contact information for owners.

However, Vauxhall believes that industry and government can work more effectively together to close the gap; for example by incorporating a check on outstanding safety recalls into the MOT process.

VAUXHALL STATEMENT - Information about fires that may occur within certain models and certain engines.

Customer safety is of the utmost importance and we take any report of fire very seriously.

Fires can occur for a wide variety of reasons and it’s worth noting that, on average, there are 18,000 vehicle fires a year across all manufacturers in the UK*.  It is estimated that there are c35 million vehicles registered in the UK.

Vauxhall Corsa D is one of our most popular models, with over 700,000 sold in the UK between 2006 and 2014. Earlier this year we identified a potential fire related issue with a specific Corsa D variant equipped with the 1.4 Turbo petrol engine.  Nine cases had previously been reported to us, which we investigated. Two of these cases had resulted in a fire.  A Safety Recall to address this issue was initiated in April 2016 for the 2,767 vehicles affected.

When customers report a fire to us we explain that an inspection may be necessary but that we need the permission of their insurance company before we can proceed. This avoids the risk of the customer's insurance policy being invalidated.

Our preference is to conduct a joint investigation with the customer’s insurer but for a variety of reasons this is not always possible. For example, in some cases the insurance company has already conducted an investigation. In other cases the vehicle may have already been scrapped.

Following the Zafira B issue we strengthened our processes but even so it is not always possible to arrange an inspection.

What’s more, the destructive nature of fire can make the process of identifying a pattern of fires with a common root cause very challenging.

It’s also worth bearing in mind that manufacturers frequently do not get to hear about fires in their vehicles. We found with Zafira B, for example, that many cases only emerged after media reports in October 2015. Some of these dated back several years.

Better access to vehicle fire data could help manufacturers with early detection of safety issues. We are therefore working through our Industry body to understand how manufacturers can gain access to data in order to build a more complete picture of potential issues.

Customers with concerns relating to the issues raised by Watchdog are advised to visit www.vauxhall.co.uk/watchdog