Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps he is taking to address skills shortages (a) among HGV drivers and (b) in the road transport sector.

The Government has a multi-pronged approach to tackling this problem. It has invested in skills bootcamps to train up to 11,000 more people to become HGV drivers to help tackle the HGV driver shortage. These are free, short, intensive courses to train drivers to be road ready and gain a Category C or Category C&E licence.

The Government is also supporting lorry driver training through apprenticeships. The Large Goods Vehicle Driver apprenticeship, which trains drivers to gain their Cat C&E licence, has recently had its funding level increased to £8,000. The Urban Driver apprenticeship which trains drivers to Cat C standard is also available with up to £5,000 of funding.

The Department for Transport has also supported the non-profit initiative Road to Logistics to train military service leavers, ex-offenders and the long term unemployed to move into jobs in the logistics sector, including lorry driving.

These measures are working with industry reporting that the acute driver shortage has eased. We continue to work with the sector to monitor the availability of drivers and tackle the issues affecting both the recruitment and retention of HGV drivers.

Following the actions raised during the driver shortages (buses and coaches) summit held in November 2022, the Department plans to consult on removing the regulatory 50km restriction on 18- to 20-year-old bus and coach drivers driving a regular service, and allowing prospective drivers to undertake the theory and off-road manoeuvre tests prior to being granted a provisional bus license. Since the summit, figures from the Confederation of Passenger Transport show that the vacancy rate for bus drivers in Great Britain fell from a high of 9.3% in September 2022 to 6.5% in May 2023.