If bank finance was available, the annual car sales figures for this recession should be in the region of 110,000 units a year in Ireland.
That's the view of the general manager of Suzuki Ireland, Niall O'Gorman, who says the lack of finance is throttling the sales of new cars, and at the same time depriving the state of much needed car-related tax.
"In the 80s recession, there were still 1 million people employed, and at its lowest the sales of cars were 55,000 a year," he said during the international launch of the new generation Suzuki Swift. "This time we have 2 million employed, so it is fair to say that we should be able to sell twice as many cars."
The forecast for 2010 sales is now 85,000 units, substantially up on the 2009 performance.
Niall O'Gorman says scrappage has contributed to more than the 10,000 cars sold under the scheme, which runs out at the end of the year.
"The existance of scrappage made it socially acceptable to have a new car in a recession, which was not the case last year. If there's no scrappage next year, I believe the sales could slip back by more than the scrappage factor."
But he emphasised that the biggest difficulty remains the lack of finance, preventing people whose circumstances are positive from replacing their current vehicle.
