New car registrations were down 17.5 per cent in August and conditions will remain challenging through the rest of the year, said Paul Everitt, SMMT chief executive.

“The industry enjoyed a better than expected first half of the year and, despite the difficulties, SMMT is forecasting that new car registrations will close just ahead of 2009 figures.” August will be the lowest volume month of 2010, and typically only accounts for 3.3 per cent of annual sales ahead of the plate change in September. Last August over 16,000 cars or 25 per cent of the market was reportedly through the scrappage scheme.

The market for new ‘60’ plate cars is expected to decline by around 10 per cent in September, from 367,929 units last year. The market is forecast to slow from the current annual running rate of 2.146 million units to 2.018 million units by the end of the year.

Over the first seven months of 2010 the market remains 13.2 per cent above 2009 with private and fleet volumes up by a similar amount. In August, as in July, the fleet market continued to recover whilst private volumes fell away from the scrappage-fuelled levels of 2009.

Diesel-fuelled cars once again saw their market share reach a new high, of 52.6 per cent in the month, in part reflecting the drop in petrol-fuelled car registrations.

Over the year-to-date the supermini and lower medium segment markets have contributed the largest volume to the market’s growth, but they, along with the mini segment, recorded a sharp decline in August volumes. MPV, dual-purpose (SUV), executive and luxury saloon segments have sustained their strong growth momentum. The Ford Fiesta was the best selling model in August and the year-to-date.