A transport minister has responded to criticism about new DVSA measures which are designed to cut waiting times for new driving tests.
The UK Government is recruiting 450 new driving examiners in a bid to slash test waiting times from 21 weeks to just seven weeks by December 2025.
The significant expansion will bolster the current workforce of 1,456 full-time equivalent examiners and improve conditions for learner motorists.
Transport minister Lord Hendy told the House of Lords that the first group of new recruits is already “about to start doing driving tests”.
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Ministers in the House of Lords debated the new DVSA reforms earlier this afternoon
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The move comes as part of broader efforts to address lengthy delays in the driving test system.
Conservative peer Lord Young of Cookham has raised concerns about “middlemen hoovering up slots” on the DVSA website and reselling them at premium rates to learner drivers.
During Monday’s House of Lords session, Lord Young asked: “Why doesn’t the Government just get on with this and ban this racket?”
Former Transport Secretary Lord Grayling also questioned the current system, asking: “Why is it that any driving test can be booked anywhere except the official DVSA website?”
Transport minister Lord Hendy responded that changes must be implemented carefully “so that we don’t inadvertently make it more difficult for legitimate people looking for tests to book them”.
The Government has already introduced “tougher terms and conditions” for test bookings, which came into effect on January 6.
These measures aim to balance the need to stop exploitation while protecting legitimate users of the booking system.
Lord Hendy explained that a “quarter of total test bookings had been swapped from one licence to another” as part of legitimate instructor practices.
He noted that “driving instructors can apply for a test for one pupil and then transfer it to another if the second pupil is making faster progress than the first”.
“We have to do that in a way which doesn’t prevent driving instructors from running decent businesses and also allows people to change their bookings when they need to,” he added.
Conservative peer Lord Hannan blamed “state failure” for the rise of secondary markets in driving test slots, linking the problem to lockdown measures.
Lord Hannan said he has two children who have been affected by the difficulty in getting a test, suggesting that Government employees should “return to office work”.
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The new DVSA rules for driving tests were introduced on January 6
PA
Lord Hendy dismissed this suggestion with a pointed response that drew laughter: “The one thing that driving examiners can’t do is work in an office.”
He emphasised that reducing the time between application and test was “the real answer” to the issue.