HC Deb 05 March 2003 vol 400 cc1020-1W
Mr. Norman

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many staff were employed by the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency in each year since 1997. [100457]

Mr. Jamieson

The information requested is as follows:

Year Number of staff employed (full time equivalent)
1997 3,801
1998 4,124
1999 4,408
2000 4,773
2001 5,268
2002 5,264

Extra staff were required by the Agency for the following reasons:

  1. (a) major new initiatives such as the Statutory Off-Road Notification photographs on driving licences and Graduated Vehicle Excise Duty (712 posts);
  2. (b) projects to implement policy changes, safeguard delivery of the core business and improve internal processes (168 posts);
  3. (c) increased workload such as the introduction of extended hours in the Agency's call centre, and growth of volume transactions. Between 1996–97 and 2001–02, driver and vehicle volumes increased by almost 20 per cent., from 81.8 million transactions to 97.8 million (583 posts).