WASHINGTON — U.S. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said Tuesday that it had taken “an enormous effort” to get Toyota to recall vehicles in the United States, and said federal regulators were not done with their investigations.
“Since questions were first raised about possible safety defects, we have been pushing Toyota to take measures to protect consumers,” LaHood said in a statement. “While Toyota is taking responsible action now, it unfortunately took an enormous effort to get to this point.”
“We’re not finished with Toyota and are continuing to review possible defects and monitor the implementation of the recalls.”
LaHood told the Associated Press in an interview that Toyota
was “a little safety-deaf.” He said last week that the automaker would
not have recalled its vehicles had federal safety officials not pushed
for it.
Toyota’s top U.S. official, Yoshibi Inaba, is set to testify at a congressional hearing Feb. 10. Toyota also faces another hearing from the investigation subcommittee headed by U.S. Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., on Feb. 25.
Toyota has suggested
that its recalls of 2.3 million vehicles for accelerator pedals that
could stick, along with the shutdown of six factory lines and the sales
halt of eight models, was done with an abundance of caution following a
few reports in October. But the automaker also told federal officials
it had first received complaints about the pedals as early as March 2007, and changed their design twice before the recall.
In addition, the automaker had to be pushed by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
into its original recall of floor mats that could trap accelerator
pedals against the floor. That recall has now expanded to 5.4 million
vehicles nationwide, and NHTSA has said it has confirmed the problem is
linked to five deaths in two accidents.
Safety advocates claim Toyota’s defects are linked to at least 19 deaths.
LaHood said federal safety officials flew to Japan in December “to remind Toyota management about its legal obligations.” NHTSA officials were upset that Toyota did not stop selling vehicles immediately when it announced the pedal recall Jan. 21; the automaker has said it was hoping to find a fix for the problem before having to issue a stop-sale order.
—
(c) 2010, Detroit Free Press.
Visit the Freep, the World Wide Web site of the Detroit Free Press, at http://www.freep.com.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
