DVLA Closures (Scotland)

Sheila Gilmore Excerpts

Wednesday 7th March 2012 Westminster Hall

[Mr Frank Doran (Aberdeen North) (Lab)]

I am grateful for having secured this debate.

The Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency is an important organisation in respect of the service it provides to motorists and the £5.7 billion a year that it raises for the Treasury. I shall focus on the problems arising from the DVLA’s proposals to close 39 of its local offices, particularly those in Scotland, because there is a Scottish angle that I am anxious to discuss with the Minister.

I shall focus on my local office. The office in my constituency is particularly busy, as are most of the offices throughout the country. Some 2.4 million people a year use their local DVLA office. The figures show that between 80,000 and 90,000 people a year use the Aberdeen office. In the past three years, there have been more than 250,000 transactions involving individuals using their local DVLA office for various purposes. Some 79 services are provided by DVLA at local offices.

On examination, the figures are stark. For example, Aberdeen has one of the highest rates of use of personal number plates, or cherished number plates to use the DVLA term—about 18,000 in the past three years. People might expect nothing less from an area that is fairly rich in oil and gas money.

The proposal is to transfer all the functions of the 39 offices to Swansea, which is the main headquarters of the DVLA. The consultation document by the DVLA and the Department for Transport is one of the weakest that I have seen: we are getting motherhood and apple pie and heading for sunny uplands, but there is little—virtually nothing—about the 1,200 jobs that will be lost in this process and little risk assessment of the financial analysis. We are not even told how much the Department expects to save in this operation. In addition to all that, there is no impact assessment and no consideration of what the consumer—the customer—is likely to face.

[Sheila Gilmore (Edinburgh East) (Lab)]

The Edinburgh local office, which is not in my constituency, although I have constituency work there—it is in the constituency of the hon. Member for Edinburgh West (Mike Crockart)—provides a service for the motor trade, which it finds valuable because it enables it to carry on its business swiftly and efficiently with people with whom it has built up a relationship. Does my hon. Friend agree that the loss of that service is a loss to those businesses?

[Mr Doran]

Indeed, it is. Motor dealers who have sold a car want it to be registered as quickly as possible. Registration is one of the largest components of the work of the office in my constituency. A significant number of objections or letters of complaint from the motor trade have been sent to the DVLA as part of the consultation. The motor trade will be damaged substantially by the local closures.

Another option is to replace the local offices with the Post Office. I have no objection to business going to the Post Office—we all want our local post offices to improve their businesses—but no one in that organisation can provide the technical help and support that the local DVLA offices provide. The other option is to go online. I am happy that the DVLA have made significant progress in this area. I have re-registered my car simply online: it works well and I am pleased about that.