Learner drivers wait minimum of four months for a test
Learner drivers are facing a wait of at least four months for their tests, double the length of delays before the Covid pandemic according to data from the Department for Transport (DfT).
Those learning in the Midlands, South West and South East are forced to wait five months on average for their tests, while in the North East, the North West, Scotland and Wales the average time is four months, the figures show.
The data were provided to Neil O’Brien, the former Tory minister, who warned that some drivers would be waiting longer than this average because appointments are only released on a rolling 24-week basis.
He said: “If there are no tests available at a centre, you just can’t book anytime in the next six months.”
The DfT said it had no records of how many learners had been unable to book, but Mr O’Brien said: “It must logically be a large number as the maximum possible average wait is 24 weeks. That means people at that centre are trying and failing to book.”
Some 76 out of 241 driving test centres are fully booked, with many others close to full. There are about twice as many centres with no space for driving test appointments compared with two years ago.
Writing on newsletter website Substack, Mr O’Brien said: “The results suggest that the DfT has not got a grip on this. Indeed, the crisis has been getting worse, not better, since the pandemic.
“In Wales, Scotland and the North, wait times got longer after the pandemic and have still not caught up. But in the Midlands, South and London, it’s even worse – they got substantially worse again since the middle of 2022. The DfT trumpeted what looked like progress in January 2024, but since then things got worse again.”
End the Backlog, a group that campaigns to reduce waiting times, estimated the backlog of tests at about one million, which, at current rate of progress, they believed would never be cleared.
It said: “The backlog is currently causing huge costs in time, money, and lost opportunities to hundreds of thousands of people. It’s preventing young people from growing up and living independent lives. It’s time for the Government to take serious action to fix it.
“Any serious solution will have to involve some kind of surge capacity, since the capacity of the existing system is not enough. We suggest temporarily enlisting approved driving instructors to carry out tests.”
One police officer told the group on its website that he had been forced to pay £320 through a reseller for a driving test, five times the normal price of £62.
He said: “If I hadn’t been able to drive, I wouldn’t have been able to get my current job as a police officer.”
An 18-year-old school leaver told how he had lost the chance of his first job because it required a driving licence. Despite having completed his lessons, there was a three-month wait in his area for tests. Another told how they travelled from their home in Wimbledon to Dundee to get a test.
Mr O’Brien said he was concerned by the black market where bots were used to block-book test slots and then sell them on at a premium. Slots were also on sale to driving instructors via WhatsApp groups.
‘Black market’
He said: “This black market seems to me like a symptom not a cause of the scarcity though – if you could just book normally, the touts would collapse.
“All in all, this looks like one of those classic festering crises in government. Not quite high-profile enough to get the attention of No 10, but making a lot of people miserable.”
Lilian Greenwood, a transport minister, said: “The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency’s (DVSA) main priority is to reduce car practical driving test waiting times, whilst upholding road safety standards.
“Measures in place to reduce waiting times for customers at driving test centres, include the recruitment of driving examiners, conducting tests outside of regular hours, including at weekends and on public holidays, and buying back annual leave from driving examiners.”
A DfT spokesman said: “The Transport Secretary has already spoken to DVSA to make clear the current waiting times for tests are unacceptable and we are working with the DVSA on measures to reduce the backlog.”