McLoughlin says that the government wants to ensure that the deception committed by Volkswagen – installing software in its cars to recognise emission tests and produce more positive results – is not an industry-wide issue.
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“As part of this work they will re-run laboratory tests where necessary and compare them against real world driving emissions.
We need full disclosure and robust pollutant emissions tests in place”, said Elżbieta Bieńkowska, the EU’s commissioner for the internal market and industry.
Transport secretary Patrick McLoughlin has called on the European Union to conduct a full investigation into emission defeat devices.
United Kingdom regulator, Vehicle Certification Agency, will work with a range of manufacturers within the industry to re-test the current models of cars that are on the road in the UK.
“My priority is to protect the public as we go through the process of investigating what went wrong and what we can do to stop it happening again in the future”, he adds.
“The United Kingdom automotive industry understands the concerns consumers may have following the actions of one manufacturer in regard to emissions testing and the subsequent decision to recall a large number of its cars”.
The German car-maker has admitted 11 million vehicles worlwide were fitted with a device which conned testers in the United States into believing their vehicles met environmental standards.
Mr Winterkorn has resigned after taking responsibility for the crisis, which could cost VW billions in class-action lawsuits both in America and Europe.
Authorities will continue working with Volkswagen to determine what cars exactly are involved.
“This gap is now subject to research and earlier this month the Committee on Climate Change was told that the growth in this gap is partly due to increased exploitation of “flexibilities” in laboratory testing by vehicle manufacturers”. The share price of the rival German manufacturer BMW fell more than 5 per cent after a auto magazine reported that road tests by the global Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) – who helped spark the VW scandal – revealed one of its BMW X3 models exceeded European emissions limits by more than 11 times.
“Toyota does not engage in any practice that would seek to enhance emissions performance of its engines during regulated emissions testing or homologation cycles, nor does it use any practice that would make engine performance different during these tests”.
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France, which is heavily reliant on diesel fuel, is trying to show it’s aggressive against unsafe emissions as it prepares to host a United Nations conference this year on global warming. “All emissions systems remain active outside the testing cycles”, a statement said.
