§ Mr. SteenTo ask the Secretary of State for Transport (1) what steps he is taking to provide compensation to those driving schools whose business has been adversely affected by the failure of the DVLC, Swansea, to process heavy goods vehicle provisional licence applications within one week;
(2) how much money will be saved now that the work of the area licensing offices has been transferred to the DVLC, Swansea;
(3) what steps he is taking to reinforce the heavy goods vehicle provisional licence department at DVLC, Swansea, now that it is handling all the provisional licence applications previously dealt with by the area offices;
(4) what steps he is taking to ensure that the DVLC, Swansea, provides an equivalent or better service than that previously provided by the area licensing offices; and if he will indicate the number of days it will now take to process a provisional heavy goods vehicle licence application;
(5) how many additional staff were employed at DVLC, Swansea, to cope with the increased work load once the 11 area licensing offices stopped handling heavy goods vehicle provisional licence applications.
§ Mr. ChopeDVLA assumed full responsibility for the licensing of lorry and bus drivers from 1 April. Around 40 309W staff have been trained to deal with applications from lorry and bus drivers, with a further 20 staff in those areas dealing with medical cases and inquiries.
Because DVLA inherited some 5,000 uncompleted cases from the traffic area offices, 16 additional staff have been temporarily drafted in from other parts of DVLA to help out, and some overtime is being worked. The inquiry unit's opening hours have also been extended.
The new lorry and bus driver licensing system at DVLA should be more efficient and quicker. The new system is expected to cost around £1 million a year less to run. DVLA is already dealing with most applications in eight to nine working days, which compares well with the target of 10 working days set for the traffic area offices.
I regret that some cases, which were caught up in the transfer of work from the traffic area offices to DVLA, have taken longer. There is no provision for compensation, but when a driver or driving school has asked for a licence urgently, action has been taken whenever possible to resolve any problem and to arrange for the speedy issue of the licence. Provisional vocational driving licences are given the highest priority at DVLA.