The Min­istry of Trade and In­dus­try yes­ter­day wel­comed a High Court judg­ment that the min­istry says ruled against a for­eign-used ve­hi­cle im­porter in a claim for ju­di­cial re­view brought against it.

Ac­cord­ing to the min­istry, in the judg­ment de­liv­ered on No­vem­ber 29, 2024, the High Court ruled against Wor­rell Reg­is and Com­pa­ny who un­suc­cess­ful­ly chal­lenged the de­ci­sions tak­en by Trade and In­dus­try Min­is­ter Paula Gopee-Scoon NOT TO:

* Ap­prove as from Jan­u­ary 01, 2021 used right hand dri­ve pri­vate mo­tor ve­hi­cles (sedans, sta­tion wag­ons and Sports Util­i­ty Ve­hi­cles) that were more than three years old from the year of man­u­fac­ture even where said mo­tor ve­hi­cles may have been shipped pri­or to De­cem­ber 31, 2020;

* Reval­i­date im­port li­cences is­sued in 2020 to a date in 2021 for used right hand dri­ve pri­vate mo­tor ve­hi­cles (sedans, sta­tion wag­ons and Sports Util­i­ty Ve­hi­cles) ar­riv­ing af­ter De­cem­ber 31, 2020 as the ex­piry date of all im­port li­cences is­sued in 2020 was De­cem­ber 31, 2020;

The min­istry said the com­pa­ny ar­gued that it had a le­git­i­mate ex­pec­ta­tion to have its im­port li­cence for the clear­ing of ve­hi­cles reval­i­dat­ed by the Min­istry.

The com­pa­ny con­tend­ed that the Min­istry’s re­fusal or fail­ure to reval­i­date its im­port li­cence breached the le­git­i­mate ex­pec­ta­tion and was, there­fore, un­rea­son­able, ac­cord­ing to a news re­lease is­sued by the min­istry.

The Gov­ern­ment de­part­ment said it not­ed the fol­low­ing salient points of the Court’s de­ci­sion:

(i) The Court was sat­is­fied that the de­ci­sion made by the Min­is­ter of Trade and In­dus­try not to reval­i­date im­port li­cences is­sued in 2020 for used right hand dri­ve pri­vate mo­tor ve­hi­cles (sedans, sta­tion wag­ons and Sports Util­i­ty Ve­hi­cles) ar­riv­ing af­ter De­cem­ber 31, 2020 was ex­pe­di­ent con­sid­er­ing the fis­cal and eco­nom­ic cli­mate at the time of mak­ing the de­ci­sion and al­so the dis­cre­tionary pow­er which al­lowed the Min­is­ter un­der Reg­u­la­tion 4 of the Im­ports and Ex­ports Con­trol Reg­u­la­tions and Sec­tion 10 of the Trade Or­di­nance, 1958 to grant, re­voke and re­new li­cens­es for the im­por­ta­tion of for­eign-used ve­hi­cles;

(ii) The de­ci­sion not to reval­i­date the com­pa­ny’s im­port li­cens­es was al­so con­sis­tent with the ob­ject and pur­pos­es of the leg­is­la­tion grant­i­ng the Min­istry such dis­cre­tion as tak­en; and

(iii) The com­pa­ny’s as­ser­tion of le­git­i­mate ex­pec­ta­tion failed as it was un­able to es­tab­lish that it had sat­is­fied the con­di­tions out­lined in the Gov­ern­ment’s pol­i­cy which re­quired that ve­hi­cles be paid in full pri­or to the Oc­to­ber 5, 2020 bud­get state­ment.

On No­vem­ber 12, the Trade Li­cence Unit of the Min­istry of Trade and In­dus­try is­sued a no­tice ad­vis­ing all reg­is­tered for­eign-used car deal­ers, in­di­vid­ual im­porters and oth­er stake­hold­ers that the ex­piry date of all im­port li­cences is­sued in 2024 shall be De­cem­ber 31, 2024.

"The Trade Li­cence Unit will not be reval­i­dat­ing im­port li­cences is­sued in 2024 to a date in 2025 for used right-hand dri­ve mo­tor ve­hi­cles (sedans, sta­tion wag­ons and Sports Util­i­ty Ve­hi­cles) which ar­rive af­ter De­cem­ber 31, 2024," said the min­istry.

This hard dead­line for the im­por­ta­tion of the for­eign-used cars has caused some con­cern among deal­ers be­cause the re­cent in­dus­tri­al prob­lems at the Port of Port of Spain.

Th Trade Li­cence Unit al­so re­mind­ed the pub­lic that the per­mis­si­ble age for the im­por­ta­tion of used right-hand dri­ve mo­tor ve­hi­cles (sedans, sta­tion wag­ons and Sports Util­i­ty Ve­hi­cles) is: three years from the date of man­u­fac­ture for ve­hi­cles out­fit­ted with a gaso­line, diesel, CNG or hy­brid en­gine; and two (2) years from the date of man­u­fac­ture for ve­hi­cles out­fit­ted with an elec­tric mo­tor pow­ered by a recharge­able bat­tery pack.