Hundreds of number plates banned by DVLA for being too offensive for the road
If you're getting a new car from September of this year onwards then you'll be getting one of the '73' plates fixed onto your motor.
The DVLA has got a list of combinations it won't be letting you have in case you end up with a car where the number plate looks like it says something naughty and there's a hell of a lot of banned ones.
While there's always going to be some rude words Brits can make, this time there's plenty more combinations you could get as the numbers as the sort of thing you'd already slot in for certain letters.
The DVLA is not standing for any number plate tomfoolery and twice a year they have to meet up and put together a list to figure out which plates 'may cause offence, embarrassment or are in poor taste'.
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While the list of banned plates looks rather long, it's actually quite small in comparison with the huge amount of 73 plates which will go into circulation when the newly registered cars go onto the road later this year.
Pretty much any combination you could think of which would end up creating some sort of slur, swearword or slang term for naughty bits is going to be counted out.
Imagine being part of that meeting, trying to figure out all the ways one could spell rude words with the next batch of number plates.
Plenty of the banned plates pretty much ignore the 73 and will stay banned regardless of what's between them, so plates like 'FF73 CCK', 'AS73 H0L' and 'B073 L0X' are going to be out no matter what.
However, since the 7 looks like a 'T' an the 3 can be a substitute for an 'E' there's even more combinations to steer clear from.
Reasons plates get banned range from sexually explicit content through to homophobic slurs and racist terms.
On the more wholesome side there will be people hoping to get a 73 plate which can spell out their name, as we said before these particular numbers lend themselves well to spelling out words.
Oddly enough certain terms which are blatantly quite explicit can be bought as custom plates, and indeed the 'ORG 45M' plate is among the more expensive ones you can get in the UK.
Last year's banned list included plenty of plates which referenced the coronavirus pandemic, with plates like 'CO22 RNA' and 'CO22 VD' among those people weren't allowed to get.
Auto Express has managed to obtain the latest list full of all the new plates you won't be allowed to use come September.
Joe Harker