Major changes have been announced today for the driving test.
Only learner drivers will be able to book driving tests and the Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander told MPs on the Transport committee that third parties would be banned from reselling slots to stop people being “exploited” by online bots.
It is all part of plans aimed at reducing long waiting lists and preventing slots being sold at inflated prices to penalise learners.
The national shortage of driving examiner will be tackled in the short term by using 36 MoD examiners to conduct tests one day a week for 12 months until more civilian examiners can be recruited and kept.
These welcome moves, however, will not reduce the waiting time for tests to seven weeks by summer 2026 because an examiner recruitment drive by the DVSA brought in 316 testers but many had left the system and it resulted in a net gain of just 40 examiners.
Ms Alexander also said a limit would be placed on the number of times a driver can move or swap a test, and the area they can move a test to once they’ve booked it.
