Toyota Motor (TM)

[Pro-Life]

U.S. Wants to Know When Toyota Knew of Problems

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/17/business/17toyota.html?partner=yahoofinance

DETROIT — Federal safety regulators in Washington said on Tuesday that they were investigating whether Toyota had acted quickly enough in recalling millions of vehicles to repair defective accelerator pedals.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said it was seeking documents from Toyota showing when the carmaker had learned of problems with the pedals and how long it had waited before initiating recalls.

Federal law requires manufacturers to notify the agency within five days of identifying a defect and then to begin a recall promptly. If Toyota is found to have waited too long, the government said it could fine the automaker up to $16.4 million, which is the maximum allowed by the law. The largest such fine levied against an automaker is $1 million.

“Safety recalls are very serious matters and automakers are required to quickly report defects,” the transportation secretary, Ray LaHood, said in a statement.

The safety agency has itself come under some scrutiny about the timeliness of its response to reports of unintended acceleration in Toyota cars and trucks. State Farm, the big insurer, alerted regulators in 2007 about instances of Toyotas experiencing sudden acceleration. At least three Congressional hearings are scheduled, two of them next week, to examine the role of the safety agency.

The inquiry being opened on Tuesday involves three recalls covering about six million vehicles in the United States. In addition to the January recall for potentially sticky accelerator pedals and a November recall involving accelerator pedals that could become trapped under the floor mat, the government is looking into a 2007 recall of the Toyota Camry and Lexus ES 350 sedans. That was the first recall in which Toyota said floor mats could cause unintended acceleration by interfering with pedals.

Recalls begun this month — for a flaw in the braking systems of more than 400,000 hybrid cars, including Prius sedans, and for a problem with the front driveshaft of 8,000 Tacoma pickups — are not being examined.

Toyota said in a statement that it was reviewing the regulator’s request for documentation and would “cooperate to provide all the information they have requested.”

“Toyota takes its responsibility to advance vehicle safety seriously and to alert government officials of any safety issue in a timely manner,” the statement said.

The inquiry came as Toyota’s president, Akio Toyoda, prepared to conduct a news conference about the recalls in Japan on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, the company said it would temporarily idle two plants in the United States to reduce inventories, an indication that Toyota sales remained slow this month.

Toyota plans to halt assembly of sedans in Georgetown, Ky., on Feb. 26, and for up to three days in March and April, a company spokesman, Mike Goss, said. A pickup truck plant in San Antonio will be idled the weeks of March 15 and April 12.

Workers at the plants will still be asked to report for training and “plant improvement activities,” Mr. Goss said in an e-mail message.

Toyota sales fell 16 percent in January after it halted sales and production of eight models that were part of the recall that month. Production resumed after a week, and dealers can now sell the affected models after repairing the accelerator pedal.