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U-turn on driver testin
Page 32
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• The Government's privatisation programme suffered a set-back last week, following the publication of the DTp's Review of Driver Testing, which concludes that a privatised system would have to charge more, would be hard to set-up and lead to deteriorating service.
In March this year the thenTransport Secretary, John Moore, announced there would be an internal review of driver testing by the DTp, "to consider the scope for improvement in the discharge of driver testing functions, whether by the department, or under delegation to the private sector."
The aim of the review was not merely to see whether testing should join the other pieces of "the family silver" being sold back to the private sector. Over the past few years the DTp's driver testing function has come in for strong criticism, (primarily in the car sector) for long delays, high failure rates and low standards. The report's conclusions, however, obviously affect both HGV and PSV testing.
For the record, during the 1986/87 financial year the DTp's 100 HGV and PSV examiners conducted 50,000 HGV and 15,000 PSV tests from 57 full-time and 15 parttime test centres.
CONSULTATION
Two months after Moore's announcement the department sent out its promised consultative letter to a variety of trade organisations listing its terms of reference for the review, and asking for comments.
Privatisation has been a major part of the review process, with the DTp saying it would be considering whether a service which met safety standards, had public confidence, was convenient and cost effective "could be provided if the function were delegated to the private sector, and at what a cost."
Boiled down, the key question is whether private individuals, such as driving instructors, should be allowed to test their pupils.
Not suprisingly there has been a mixed reaction from the road transport lobby. The Road Haulage Association has no doubt that "the entire task of testing HGV drivers should be delegated to the private sector. While the framework of policy and regulation should be maintained by the DTp, the administration of a system of inspection and registration should be delegated to the RTITB."
According to the RHA, many Group Training Associations, and company centres that carry out driver training could be used for driver testing as part of the same operation. "The utilisation of GTA and company centres would bring considerable financial savings to the industry. . . great productivity . . . and capacity for innovation in work patterns in the private sector." It maintains that privatising driver testing will raise standards, improve pass rates and save public money.
The Freight Transport Association does not agree. While it says it has "no firm views of principle as to whether the driver test schemes should be retained in the public sector", it believes that "it would be extremely difficult to maintain or impose criteria by moving to the private sector, whether profit-making or not, in particular we strongly believe that the objectives could not be achieved by a fragmented scheme."
To illustrate its point the FTA says that "there is ample evidence with the MoT car and light van vehicle testing scheme to demonstrate the difficulty of maintaining uniform standards through a system operated by a large number of independent outlets."
The Society of Civil and Public Servants (the union representing testers) has been less restrained. According to assistant secretary David Heywood, "Privatisation would result in a reduction in the standard of the test, with the likelihood of corrupt operators using it as a licence to print money. It would mean a worse service for the public at a higher cost."
Judging by the findings of its review, which was published last week, the DTp seems to share the views of the antiprivatisation lobby — if not in the same language, then certainly in the same spirit.
Under the heading "Could instructors be allowed to conduct tests?" It states: "To allow instructors to test their own pupils, and those taught by other instructors at the same driving school, would introduce such large potential conflicts of interest that it would not be practicable to provide sufficiently strong supervision to guarantee uniform standards and maintain public confidence. Instructors might be tempted either to fail candidates to gain more busines, or be pressurised to pass candidates to maintain their reputation."
SAFEGUARDS
The review adds that safeguards provided by the existing system "would be removed if instructors acted as part-time examiners. Under the current system, in order to reduce the scope for corruption steps are taken to ensure the candidate does not know who will examine him. This safeguard would disappear if instructors were allowed to offer a service freely to meet demand."
The DTp says that there would also be "strong opposition within the industry to instructors from one school testing another's pupils. A recent proposal that relief HGV examiners should be provided by some of the training bodies met with fierce opposition."
The review's author also states that "The precedent of the attempt to privatise HGV testing suggests that there would be strong parliamentary opposition to instructors having an interest in testing. In the case of HGV testing opposition was such that provisions precluding vehicle operators having interest in private sector testing bodies were added at the third reading to what was to become the 1982 Transport Act."
It concludes, quite simply, that "it would not be feasible to allow instructors to conduct tests".
The review states that if examiners are not allowed to do related work, the scope for a private sector organisation deriving a profit from testing, other than by adding to the fee which a non-profit making organisation would have charged, "is very limited."
The high cost of actually transferring HGV driver testing to the private sector is also given as a reason against privatisation. Faced with these arguments, it was hardly surprising that last week Transport Secretary Paul Channon told the Commons: "I am inclined to accept the review's general conclusion that the best way forward would be to build on the current system rather than privatise driver testing."
Channon will no doubt be relieved that he will not have to force through what is obviously a contentious issue. Whether his predecessor, freemarket proponent John Moore, would have made such a Uturn, however, can only be guessed at.