Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between David Mowat and Mike Penning

Tuesday 9th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)]

Previous grooming trials have been characterised by intimidatory and vicious cross-examination by defence barristers, and often by multiple defence barristers. Will the Minister assure us that steps are being taken to stop that happening?

[Mike Penning]

Although I cannot interfere in the role of barristers in the courts, we are looking at the matter very closely and have piloted the use of video conferencing so that evidence can be given remotely or from behind a screen. It is vital that victims have the confidence to become witnesses, and I will do everything in my power to ensure that they have the support they need to do so.

Arbroath and Forfar Driving Test Centres

Debate between David Mowat and Mike Penning

Tuesday 18th January 2011 Westminster Hall

[Mike Penning]

When someone passes their test, there is no restriction at all on where they can drive in the country. Someone can pass their test in Angus, drive to the nearest dual carriageway on their own and go down the motorway. I am also seriously considering how we can give the relevant skills to young drivers who have never driven on a motorway in their life, whether or not someone is sat next to them. At the moment, they can pass their test and go straight on the motorway. We must work on dealing with that.

I am surprised that the hon. Gentleman has not looked at the changes that have recently been made to the driving test. We have dealt with the problem of someone going to an area because they know it. We are not publishing the routes that people take for their test, and instructors will not know what the examiners are going to do. However, I agree that people have to understand how to drive on rural roads, which we have in parts of my constituency as well as in that of the hon. Gentleman, and in urban areas. We must have a situation in which we increase the skill base. I have listened to the instructors in certain areas and they have said, “This will have a detrimental effect because we will have to teach them to go there.” That is based on old knowledge and on the fact that we used to publish the routes that examiners would take. We are no longer going to do that. They will not know the routes. People will not only have to be able to drive for 10 minutes without being guided, which is what happens when people have passed their test, but they will not know the routes. The instructors do not know the routes; things will not happen that way.

This a short debate, so let us touch on the important points raised by the hon. Gentleman because I find some of them very worrying, especially his analogy. The reason I changed the motorcycle test is because someone could drive for up to two hours to a test centre and be taken off-road to a piece of tarmac that the Government own to do an off-road test. They could fail the test, yet be allowed to drive two hours back, or whatever the distance is. The test was not fit for purpose, which is why I have reviewed it. The whole test will be on the road, not off-road, and will be done in one go, unlike the present on-road and off-road arrangement. That will give motorcyclists the skills that will enable them to make progress, about which I have been talking in relation to car drivers. The analogy is not there.

As I have said, what is important—I will consider this matter—is that if the waiting list is as great as the hon. Gentleman says and it is blocked, these centres will not close until the capacity can be taken up in Dundee. I give that commitment today. We have to be in that situation. However, I will consider the matter of block bookings by driving instructors who pre-book extensively and block up areas, so that there are no bookings available for other people.

In the short period of time we have for the debate, let us look, if we can, at what the test should be for and see if we can go forward fixated not with buildings, but with service to the community and the people who want to take their test.

[David Mowat]

I was hoping that the debate would touch on what I regard as the major issue, which is the multi-test centres and other super-test centres. They became the policy of the previous Government because they over-interpreted an EU requirement regarding the motorcycle test. I believe that the Transport Committee, inter alia, pointed out that that was wrong, did not need to happen and was an error, yet the concept of a super-test centre is being pursued. It sounds as though that happened in Dundee and St Helens. One result of that, which the Minister might want to comment on, is that motorcyclists have to travel even further for their test, and further back if they fail it.

[Mike Penning]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The Select Committee, under the previous Administration, had real concerns about how the motorcycle test was fundamentally changed. It felt that the Government had misinterpreted guidance on kilometres—in English, motorcyclists had to do just under 31 miles an hour. I agree, fundamentally, with the Select Committee, which is why we have broken away from that. We have a pilot at the moment and we have worked with the industry—the testers, the unions and everybody out there—to get a test that I hope is closer to fit for purpose.

There is a fundamental difference, I am afraid, regarding the motorcycle test centres. A plethora of them appeared all over the country. The big problem was finding suitable off-road facilities for part one of the test. I looked at that, and the review looked at it. It was farcical that we spent millions and millions of pounds building pieces of tarmac that, in the near future, we will have to sell off because we do not need them any more.

The key issue and the most important thing, to return to what I was saying, is not the building, the instructors, Members of Parliament or Ministers, but the people who take their test. The test has to be fit for purpose. I am not at all worried about a drop in pass rates, because that would tell me something. For example, quite a few people think that their instructor is a qualified driving instructor—very often, they are not. That is something we need to look at to ensure that the public know exactly who is qualified and who is not. We need to ensure that the test is fit for purpose, and we are doing a lot of work on that.

The next stage is to ask why people who want to take their test have to go to the instructor. Why can the instructor not come to them? The two test centres mentioned earlier, in Forfar and Arbroath, are open two days a week. Why is there not a facility, whatever the demand is, for a tester to go people’s community two days a week? Why are we fixated with a Soviet system that means that people have to come to Government so that we can give them a piece of paper that says they can drive? That, to me, is the way forward. Other countries around the world have looked at that and do not have test centres that are physically big. There are test centres where instructors are based, and they then go out into the community. That would alleviate many of the concerns that the hon. Member for Angus has raised today—how far people have to go, the cost to the community, the risk to instructors and so on. Some of that fear is unfounded and I have touched on why, especially given the developments in the test, but I am more than willing to look at whether it is right, in the 21st century, that if someone wants a piece of paper or card that says that the Government say they can drive a car, motorcycle or a lorry, they have to go into a Government building in Dundee, or wherever it happens to be—in my case, in St Albans.

It is fit and proper to look closely at how the DSA works. I accept some of the criticisms. I have already said that I will look carefully at how the consultation process works. I would like to have been told. I apologise to the hon. Member for Angus for not sending him a letter, because I write to everybody when there are closures and I do not know how that one slipped through the net. I also apologise on behalf of the DSA and the Department, because I am absolutely paranoid about writing to MPs when something happens in their constituency. I think that it is very important that MPs are informed. I will look at the guidance on how the code of practice works. It is not difficult to consult on these things; it is difficult to know how far to go, but it is important that we do so. We must not, I stress, be fixated with buildings. Buildings deliver a service that could be delivered in other ways.