Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department is taking to improve the availability of practical driving tests.

Driver testing services were significantly disrupted during the pandemic, which has led to a high demand for learners who are now wanting to take their driving test.

The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) is working hard to provide as many practical driving test appointments as it can, with several measures in place to do this. These include offering a national recovery allowance and annual leave buy back to examiners, asking all those qualified to conduct tests, but who do not do so as part of their current day job, to return to conducting tests, conducting out of hours testing (such as on public holidays and weekends), and resuming the number of driving tests per day to seven for each full-time examiner.

The DVSA is also recruiting more than 300 driving examiners across Great Britain. The DVSA’s examiner recruitment campaigns continue to be successful but, like many employers, the DVSA is finding the job market extremely competitive. As it moves through each recruitment campaign, the DVSA will continually review and make changes and improvements to its recruitment and selection process, and training courses.

To reduce the number of driving tests which go to waste, the DVSA has introduced a text messaging service to remind candidates about their test, and has also launched a ‘Ready to Pass?’ campaign to improve learners’ understanding of what it means to be test ready and how they can assess their own readiness.