Gardaí seized 19,673 vehicles in Ireland during 2025 for being driven without insurance, according to a report released Monday by the Motor Insurers’ Bureau of Ireland (MIBI).
The figures, detailed in the IMID Annual Report 2025, represent a significant enforcement effort utilizing the Irish Motor Insurance Database (IMID) system. Introduced in 2024, IMID allows law enforcement to verify a vehicle’s insurance status in seconds, employing automatic number plate recognition technology and mobile device access.
This latest tally brings the total number of vehicles detained for lacking insurance to 38,546 over the first two years of the IMID system’s operation. Alongside the seizures, An Garda Síochána issued 51,024 charges and summons to drivers found to be in violation of insurance laws since 2024, with 25,009 of those issued in 2025 alone.
The IMID database contains policyholder details, vehicle registration numbers, and authorized driver information, supplied by motor insurers, brokers, fleet owners, and motor traders. As of the end of 2025, the database included details for 4,589,494 valid driver numbers and 3,646,638 vehicles.
The report also highlights the growing inclusion of fleet vehicles within the database, with details for 384,247 individual fleet vehicles added by the end of last year. MIBI acknowledges that thousands of fleet vehicles remain unlisted.
David Fitzgerald, chief executive of the MIBI, stated the bureau is “very pleased to see the contribution and impact that IMID is making towards law enforcement.” He added that driving without insurance has been “a problem in this country for quite a while” and that the database was established to streamline the identification of offenders. Fitzgerald emphasized that IMID has fundamentally altered “the whole uninsured policing picture completely,” eliminating the use of fraudulent insurance certificates or claims of mistaken identity.
