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Withhelf Marks

The British registration system dates back to 1903 and so does its censorship. In 1903 one and two letter codes were allocated to English and Welsh local authorities in order of population size from A to Y and AA to FP. One code was omitted from this sequence - DT, on the basis it stood for delirium tremens. As this article will illustrate, what at one time is considered unacceptable subsequently becomes acceptable or vice versa, and in 1927 it was decided to allocate DT to the then newly created County Borough of Doncaster. The choice of DT was appropriate, of course, as a mnemonic for Doncaster. DD was also omitted as it also stood for a form of alcoholic delirium, but this was allocated to Gloucestershire in 1921.

The final code to be omitted from the original England and Wales allocation was ER, the then royal cipher. This was allocated to Cambridgeshire in 1922. SC, SF, SG, CS, FS & GS were omitted from the Scottish allocation. The likely explanation for this is the possibility of confusing the letters C & G and E & F - at the time most number plates were hand painted, sometimes rather crudely.

Two authorities objected to the codes they were allocated in 1903. The residents of Dorset did not like BF, as this stood for "bloody fool" so this was replaced by FX. The residents of Northampton objected to having DF and they were soon given NH as an alternative code, but in 1927 DF was recommenced after it had been given to Gloucestershire.

As local authorities used up their initial two letter codes, many were allocated further codes. Somewhat surprisingly VD was commenced by Lanarkshire in 1930, though in 1977 Luton LVLO, to whom it had then passed, stopped issuing three letter codes ending in VD. By the late 1950s ony three codes remained unallocated. BF had still not been reused and the other two were OO and WC. Staffordshire and Essex were running short of available registration combinations and BF was allocated to Staffordshire and OO and WC to Essex. BF and WC were only allocated to be used on three letter combinations and the combinations ABF, UBF, AWC and UWC were not allowed. LOO and POO were, however, considered socially acceptable. Despite the ban on BF and WC in the 1950s, some BF's and WC's have now been sold in the government's Classic Auctions!

In the early 1930s local authorities started using three-letter combinations and this obviously produced more scope for rude words, it would take too long to list all banned combinations, but a few obvious examples are FUC, FUK, GOD and SEX. Not all combinations are omitted for reasons of prurience - USN was not used because of possibly confusion with US naval registrations and XXX was not used because it was a police radio call sign. DWO was not issued, but nobody has given an explanation for this. APE is a banned combination but this was actually issued in error by Guildford with T-suffix.

In 1953 reversed registrations were first issued. This only raised two censorship problems. One was the possibility of confusion between the letter "O" and the number "0". Taking 3890 RF, for example, had 389 ORF also been issued there would have been scope for confusion. Many authorities, such as Staffordshire who had the RF code included, avoided using letter "triples" commencing with the letter "O". Other authorities, however, used triples commencing with the letter "O" but did not use numbers ending with zero.

The second problem was that trade plates were in the format 123 AB and most local authorities avoided the possibility of confusion by not using the combinations reserved for trade plates. For instance, using RF as an example, this series started at 1000. Other series started at lower numbers, like RE (another Staffordshire code) which started at 500. Recently DVLA has, of course, started selling combinations from partially issued series in the Classic Auctions and most such registrations come from these blocks originally reserved for trade plates. The cautious bureaucrats of the 50s and 60s who avoided this duplication have inadvertently managed to provide a bonanza for DVLA as it has meant more low and consequently desirable numbers were available for sale by auction.

The introduction of year letters in 1963 indirectly resulted in another reason for censorship being introduced. Because it became desirable to disguise the age of one's vehicle, cherished numbers became more popular and in the late 1970s it became the policy to avoid issuing cherishable numbers as normal registrations. However, a few have inevitably slipped through the net over the years, e.g. BEAST, CLA 55Y, NE 55Y, A911 POR and H151 MON (HI SIMON). In 1978/79 combinations ending in xxG IT and xxT IT were withheld, though some examples have been sold in the Classic Auctions, e.g. TAG IT and PUT IT.

When year prefixes commenced in 1983, the numbers 1-20 were withheld for subsequent sale. Also in the "A" year, 55 and 550-9 were not issued for obvious reasons. Around this time most Local Offices stopped issuing "desirable" combinations, e.g. DON, PAM, BMW. Practice has not always been consistent in this respect. For example, Chelmsford withheld SOO when it was due to be issued in the "A" year but issued it in the "D" and "V" years. Early in the "G" year it was announced that 666 would no longer be issued because of its satanic overtones, though this decision was subsequently reversed in that it can now be purchased under the government's Select scheme.

In 1996 DVLA reviewed the list of banned combinations. Some which were previously banned became available under the Select scheme, such as ABF, APE, AWV, BBF, BOG, FAG, HOG, LAV, NBG, SOT, and UWC. One could only be allocated such a registration by deliberately buying it. DWO and GPO, which had previously been reserved for Post Office use only and UBF were made generally available.

The new registration system introduced in 2001 has created censorship issues. FO & FU have been completely censored as letter pairs at the beginning of the mark. In addition FK, VD and WC have only been available for purchase under the Select scheme - they are not available as ordinary issues. As with the old system many letter triples have also been banned. Also care has been taken to avoid groupings of letters which become potentially offensive, e.g. xx51 AGS, xx51 UTS, and xx51 UTY. period and combinations like BUxx LLY, DExx ATH and PAxx KKY have been banned. Despite this care early in the "02" period Preston Local Office caused offence by issuing PO02 combinations to garages and these were soon withdrawn.