Premier Ewart Brown believes a "culture of automobile dependency" exists in Bermuda and has led to more than 22,000 cars on the Island.

The Premier introduced the Motor Car Amendment Act 2008 and the Land and Tenant Act 2008 in the House of Assembly on Friday.

He said that on March 1, 1951 Bermuda only had 6,326 registered vehicles.

By March 1 this year, however, there were 47,856 registered vehicles with an estimated additional 4,500 unregistered vehicles.

These registered vehicles include 14,579 motorcycles over 50cc, 22,637 private cars and 1,811 trucks. The original act registered one assessment number per household, however, the Premier said loopholes were allowing these to be abused.

He said: "The purpose of the Amendment Bill before the House is to advance traffic decongestion measures designed to reduce the number of private cars operating on Bermuda's roads and to close the loopholes that exist that provide for a household to have more than one car for use by its occupants.

"It would appear that a culture of automobile dependency exists within our 21 square miles. Records show that more than 80 percent of households have a car licensed to them.

"This leaves less than 20 percent of households without a car but with a legal right to own one if they so chose.

"As the number of private cars on the roads is directly linked to the number of assessment numbers, the Island's progressive policy of limiting one car per household through assessment numbers has worked in the past, but as the number of households on the Island has increased, so has the number of cars.

"Further, abuse of the use of assessment numbers has resulted in a lack of compliance by some residents and has possibly contributed to an even greater number of cars on the roads."

The Motor Car Amendment Act 2008 states that no person can register a car unless they are in physical occupation of the residence and the person has a valid driver's licence.

While the Landlord and Tenant Act 2008 adds that in every contract of tenancy, the valuation unit number there will be requirement that the renter can use the number to register their car.

Opposition Whip John Barritt said that there was some confusion as to which loophole Government was closing with this law that had not already been addressed in the original legislation.

He said: "I would like to know what hole we are plugging? What are we putting in today that wasn't there before?

"People do it because they think they can get away with it. Why do they think they can get away with it, because nobody is enforcing the law."

The UBP's Shawn Crockwell added: "We want to encourage the Government to address this issue better. Traffic concerns need to be high on the agenda. It appear to me that the Government is trying in an ad hoc way."

MP Darius Tucker added that: "It's started to close a loophole."

While UBP MP Mark Pettingill said: "I saw an e-mail asking to rent an assessment number. So from that standard, it's a good hole to plug."

According to the Premier, visitors' exit surveys have indicated their concern about traffic in Bermuda with three percent saying it diminished the quality of their stay.

He also quashed any thought of enlarging Bermuda's roads saying: "In Bermuda, however, it is imperative that our approach lends itself to environmental sustainability and road safety.

"We cannot and will not create more and bigger roads to accommodate the ever developing culture of automobile dependency.

"This Government is committed to environmental sustainability and road safety and we will continue to work to reduce the number of vehicles operating on Bermuda's roads.

"It's a very important problem and it's a vexing problem for us in Transport. Whether or not this has teeth it's how this law and amended law will be enforced."