The Rent a Car Association, which represents around 70 companies that provide vehicles for hire, is currently investigating two of its members following a damning report issued last week by EuroTest, The Malta Independent on Sunday has learnt.

This newspaper revealed last week that Malta’s car hire industry had received intensive negative publicity in Britain and Germany, Malta’s core tourist markets, when a EuroTest report was published in the international media.

In order to gain a representative sample, the EuroTest testers rented six vehicles from different car rental companies in Bugibba: Nova Car Rentals, Avis, Compass Car Hire, Dollar Thrifty, E.M.M. Enterprises and Hertz.

Both Nova Car Rental and E.M.M. Enterprises received an overall rating of ‘very poor’ due to various shortcomings identified in the report.

In the meantime, VRT station owners and operators who called this newspaper in the course of this week expressed their incredulity at the EuroTest report and pointed out that all licensed vehicles have to pass a strict roadworthiness test. According to the same VRT sources, most of the defects mentioned in the EuroTest report and allegedly attributed to the vehicles rented in Malta, would have made those particular vehicles fail the mandatory vehicle roadworthiness test.

“Thus, the authorities should investigate how the vehicles mentioned in the report could have passed the VRT test judging from the defects found and mentioned in the report,” said one VRT owner who refused to have his name published for fear of being victimized.

On the other hand, citizens who contacted this newspaper remarked that it was a shame that the local tourism industry should be tainted by such reports when the VRT system, which has been in operation for over a decade, should have eradicated defective vehicles from the streets, let alone rented out to tourists.

“The state of certain vehicles is visible to all and sundry, yet the authorities seem to turn a blind eye and allow run-down vehicles to continue be driven around with impunity. It is unfair on law-abiding citizens, who account for the majority of motorists and who maintain their vehicles in proper condition. Even worse is the bad reputation for the tourism industry,” a reader commented.