General Motors will pay a $35 million civil penalty to settle allegations brought by the Department of Transportation that the auto maker failed to report a safety defect in the Chevrolet Cobalt in a timely manner. The defect resulted in the non-deployment of airbags in certain Chevrolet Cobalt and other GM models.

Clarence Ditlow of the Center for Auto Safety said that while the Department of Transportation did the most it could do, the ball is now in the Department of Justice’s court.

“In entering a consent agreement with GM over the ignition switch defect, the Department of Transportation (DOT) did the most that it could do under the auto safety law — impose a $35 million fine and require GM to have a system in place to ensure compliance with the recall provisions of the the auto safety law,” Ditlow said. “Congress should untie the Department’s hands and make violation of all provisions of the auto safety law criminal plus uncap civil penalties.”

“The big issue is what is the Department of Justice going to do?” Ditlow asked. “The Center for Auto Safety calls on the Justice Department to impose a billion dollar plus fine on GM and bring individual criminal prosecutions against the responsible GM officials. People died.  Justice demands more than a $35 million slap on the wrist to a hundred billion dollar corporation like GM when it kills consumers.”

In a consent decree, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) ordered GM to make significant and wide-ranging internal changes to its review of safety-related issues in the United States, and to improve its ability to take into account the possible consequences of potential safety-related defects.

Federal law requires all auto manufacturers to notify NHTSA within five business days of determining that a safety-related defect exists or that a vehicle is not in compliance with federal motor vehicle safety standards and to promptly conduct a recall. GM admits in the consent order that it did not do so.

Over the past ten years, NHTSA defect investigations resulted in 1,299 recalls involving more than 95 million vehicles and items of motor vehicle equipment, which has helped the agency to reduce vehicle fatalities to historic, all-time lows. Including today’s consent order, the agency has obtained record fines of $124.5 million in the last five years from automakers who have failed to promptly report defects to NHTSA.