Labour comes under fire for driving test backlog as thousands get blocked from UK roads

Most recently, the Committee Chairwoman Ruth Cadbury has been pressing for explanations about why waiting periods have not improved despite ongoing recruitment initiatives.

In correspondence made public this month, the Committee expressed frustration that the crisis continues despite the DVSA implementing a seven-point plan last December.

The exchange of letters between Ms Cadbury and newly appointed Roads Minister Simon Lightwood revealed mounting concern about the Government’s sluggish response to a problem affecting hundreds of thousands of learner drivers across the UK.

The Committee said it was particularly troubled by what appears to be institutional reluctance to address fundamental issues around examiner compensation and working conditions.

Despite the DVSA successfully recruiting and training 271 new driving examiners since July last year, the backlog remains severe, with more than 640,000 learners currently holding test bookings in the system.

Mr Lightwood acknowledged in his response letter that waiting periods have remained largely static throughout the second quarter and into the third quarter of 2025/26, despite the recruitment drive.

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The agency has faced ongoing challenges with retention, as experienced examiners continue to retire or depart for alternative employment, undermining efforts to expand testing capacity.

Recent recruitment campaigns have shown mixed results, with campaign 17 achieving an 11 per cent success rate from initial applications to job offers, compared to just 4 per cent in the previous campaign.

To address the retention crisis, the Government has announced an exceptional £5,000 payment for existing driving examiners, distributed in two instalments over 12 months, aimed at preventing further departures from the service.

However, the Transport Committee has questioned whether this one-off measure will have any lasting impact, particularly given the DVSA’s 12 per cent annual attrition rate disclosed in December 2024.

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In her letter, Ms Cadbury pressed the minister about what she described as “institutional resistance” to review examiners’ pay grades and employment terms, requesting a breakdown of attrition rates by length of service.

The Committee urged the Department for Transport to reconsider comprehensive reforms to examine compensation structures, arguing that temporary payments cannot solve systemic retention problems.

The much-anticipated new booking platform designed to combat resale bots remains significantly behind schedule, with development work having commenced four years ago but still only reaching the limited beta testing phase.

The Driver Services Platform, intended to replace the two-decade-old Testing and Registration System, has yet to receive assessment from the Government Digital Service, a crucial step before deployment can begin.

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Ms Cadbury’s letter demanded clarity on the implementation timeline, noting that while bot mitigation measures have been introduced to existing systems, the DVSA itself acknowledged that addressing automated booking abuse is a primary motivation for the new platform.

The Committee asked whether any measures could accelerate the platform’s development, expressing concern about the protracted timescale for what they consider an urgently needed technological upgrade.

Ms Cadbury wrote: “The difficulty with securing tests is an issue that people across the country continue to raise with me and MPs from across the House of Commons.

“With bus services so unreliable in many areas, this slow-moving crisis is stopping our constituents, particularly young people, from finding jobs, seeing friends and family, and living their lives.”