Driving Test Availability

Peter Swallow Excerpts

Wednesday 16th October 2024 Westminster Hall

[Peter Swallow (Bracknell) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the availability of driving tests.

It is an honour to serve under you as Chair, Sir Roger.

Driving test delays are a source of misery, anger and lost opportunity across my constituency and the country. Today a new learner will have to wait on average four and a half months for a driving test, which is more than double the wait nine years ago and nearly 50% higher than four years ago. New learners in my constituency must wait on average over five months for their test. Those are some of the worst waiting times in the country, and they have more than tripled since records began in 2015. That is five months during which my constituents’ travel, and therefore their ambitions, are severely restricted. Hon. Members will remember vividly the great feeling of liberation when getting behind the wheel for the first time after passing our driving tests. Today, that rite of passage, instead of a moment of great excitement, is a source of punishing expense, confusion and misery for too many of my constituents.

Take, for example, my constituent Molly, who is having to pay to do her theory again because, like the majority of drivers, she failed her first practical, and now must wait another five months to take a test. I confess that I too did not pass my driving test the first time—a fact that my partner, who did pass first time, always likes to remind me whenever I offer backseat commentary on his handling of Bracknell’s many roundabouts—but what was for me a source of slight irritation is to Molly a significant logistical hurdle with real-world costs. Having struggled to book her test the first time, she now needs to go through the whole long process again. She faces paying continued expenses to keep up lessons, using public transport to get around and possibly retaking her theory simply because it has reached its two-year limit.

Common also are stories like that of Therese, who, unable to find a test for her son for six months, booked him a test in Wales, which involved a costly round trip and an overnight stay, all just to get a test sorted in a reasonable timeframe. Other constituents have contacted me who have gone as far afield as the Isle of Wight and Aberdeen to get tests. Aberdeen is 500 miles from my constituency. When even simple systems like the provision of driving exams break down, inequalities deepen and opportunities dry up. Young people in my area are now seeing their career aspirations and their education take a hit as they look at a half-year delay before they can gain the independence of driving.

There has been national and regional coverage of this story for years, since the 2020 spike in driving test demand, yet the previous Conservative Government failed to get a grip of the crisis. On the one hand, they talked a big game, asking examiners to work ever-longer hours in an ever-exhausting push for short-term solutions—then on the other, they blamed examiners for striking over pay and conditions. What did that fiddling around at the edges get us? Today, waiting lists are more than double where they were in August 2020 and young learners are exposed to more vicious test touting than at any time since.

It is true that the DVSA responded to the immediate spike in 2020 by adding 1,000 more test slots and, over the year 2022-23, cancelling the accounts of more than 600 fake businesses abusing its service to block-book test slots just to sell them on, yet driving test centres in the year to March 2024 also cancelled more than 68,000 tests due to illness and industrial action. Driving instructors in my constituency tell me that that is often last minute and, due to the delays, pushes students back months. An increasing number of students are turning to the black market to get hold of tests, exposing themselves to fraud, abuse and spiralling hidden costs as test touters continue to exploit multiple flaws in the booking system to fuel their exploitative business models.

[David Williams (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend talked about driving instructors, and there is also a significant backlog in the driving tests required to qualify as a driving instructor. Does he agree that it is important that we look to address that backlog as well?

[Peter Swallow]

Absolutely. I have also spoken to businesses in my constituency that have highlighted the huge difficulties with getting tests for driving larger minivans and lorries. This debate is about not just bog- standard driving tests to get on the road, although that is a significant issue, but the whole system-wide problem.

Examiner illness is not something that the Conservative party can be blamed for, but whether it was striking doctors, nurses, train drivers or driving test examiners, the Conservative legacy is one of pushing workers to the brink then denying responsibility when industrial action is the inevitable result. I heard from my constituent Chris, a driving instructor, who explained how the local community of instructors are at their wits’ end over the issue, and feel powerless to stop students turning to the black market to book tests.

Driving examiners in Bracknell are getting up before 6 am on a Monday morning, when local centres release a week’s worth of tests, and by 6.02 am every single slot is gone. Those tests are six months away, yet greedy and unscrupulous test touters are using bots and fake business accounts to block-book those sessions and sell them on at ludicrous premiums. My constituents are scraping together hundreds of pounds to pay double or triple the test price only to have their details cloned, and these black market operators then use them to squeeze others out of the market. Meanwhile, some learners are, more innocently, paying big fees to apps and websites that simply trawl the DVSA database and spot cancelled tests for drivers to book at the last minute, which has fuelled understandable concerns. The drivers are showing up to tests underprepared, winging it in the hope that they just about pass, rather than waiting five months to take a test when they are properly ready.

I urge the Minister to set out what steps can be taken to end this financial abuse. The practice of test touting is against DVSA policy, but what more can we do to end it all together? Has the Minister considered whether the practice of reselling driving tests for profit can be made illegal—in line with our plans to tackle ticket touting—or can the system be fixed so that only legitimate driving instructors are able to transfer tests between their students?

Learner drivers pushed into taking their tests early by a broken system are more likely to fail, and therefore more likely to need to book another test, thereby further fuelling pressure on test centres and pushing up demand. What more can we do to ensure that more learners pass first time, unlike me? Will the Minister also ask the DVSA to investigate opening a test centre in my constituency? It sits in a desert of driving test provision between the M3 and M4. The nearest test centres to Bracknell are Reading and Farnborough. How can it be practical that a town of more than 120,000 people is not served by its own test centre?

If I may, I will touch on the connected subject of car insurance. For many young people, the financial pressure of becoming a new driver does not abate when they have finally managed to book and then pass their test. Next comes a hefty bill for car insurance. It is perfectly reasonable for younger and otherwise less experienced drivers to be charged more for car insurance, as statistically they are more likely to have an accident, but too many of my constituents are paying far more than is reasonable. Car insurance premiums have shot up by 21% since June 2022. This is not just an issue for young people in my constituency; I have also been contacted by older drivers, with many years’ experience on the road, who are being priced out of the market all together. I would therefore like to take this opportunity to welcome the action taken by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport today to launch a new taskforce to address that pressing matter.

The struggles faced by my constituents and by learner drivers across the country represent a brake on our national productivity and an unbearable frustration to our young people who, in understandable desperation, are exposing themselves to fraud and financial abuse at the hands of bad actors cynically exploiting this situation.

[Adam Jogee (Newcastle-under-Lyme) (Lab)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving way, which is a nice thing to be able to say from the Back Benches here. He raises an important point and as he touches on insurance, I wonder whether I can bring in the issue of inadequate public transport, particularly in Madeley and in Betley in Newcastle-under-Lyme. I increasingly receive letters and emails from people who see their ability to secure a test after they have failed the first one now being pushed further and further away. The relevant period is rather like the five months that my hon. Friend refers to, but there is a double whammy because of the lack of any viable, meaningful, and affordable public transport, particularly in Madeley and Betley. Without that, and with the pressures of available driving tests being pushed further and further away, many of my constituents, like those in Bracknell, are left at breaking point.

[Peter Swallow]

That is a fantastic point, and perhaps another day I could opine on our train links, which have not improved since the 1970s. That, I fear, is a debate for another day, but my hon. Friend’s point is an excellent one. Not only young people are affected, but many young people look to passing their driving test to give them a real sense of liberation and freedom. That is particularly true in communities where public transport, after 14 years of Conservative Government, is not where it should be. It therefore must absolutely be the priority of this Government to improve transport connectivity for all communities and, in particular, rural and semi-rural communities. It is clear that this Government must be—and are—on the side of the driver. For that reason, I urge the Minister to make real headway on this really important issue.

This situation cannot continue. After years of chaos under the Conservatives, this Government have inherited a broken test system and must now fix another Tory mess. All the while, my constituents face unacceptable waits and undue stress. Passing the driving test should be a moment of great joy and freedom but, for too many, the journey to passing has become a one-way trip to frustration and misery.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

--- Later in debate ---

[Peter Swallow]

I start by thanking the Minister for the incredibly constructive way in which she has approached this debate and responded to the wide-ranging and serious issues raised by Members. It is heartening to hear her reiteration that this is a priority for the new Labour Government. That is demonstrated by the Secretary of State’s meeting with the CEO of the DVSA at such an early stage. I am grateful that Ministers have asked the DVSA to look at what more can be done to tackle test touts, and I welcome further updates in due course on this. Test touts are taking advantage, and we must crack down on them.

I also thank the Minister for updating us on the situation of employing more driving examiners, which will be very welcome indeed for my constituents. However, I would tempt her once again to examine opening a new test centre in Bracknell; even better than having more driving examiners would be having another place to put them. That would be really wonderful.

I thank hon. Members across the House for taking part in this debate. We heard about constituents affected across the country, from Strangford to Hastings and Rye, Reading Central, Portsmouth North, Kettering, Telford, Sittingbourne and Sheppey, Carlisle and Ilford South. That demonstrates the breadth of this issue.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the availability of driving tests.