Driving test waiting times are still more than 10 weeks, despite hopes that this target could be met by the middle of the year.
A briefing document prepared for the new Minister of State with responsibility for road safety James Lawless put the average estimated waiting time for learner drivers who have applied for a test at more than 15 weeks.
His predecessor, Jack Chambers, told the Dáil earlier this year that waiting times had reduced from 30 weeks last August to 15 weeks by the end of March.
Mr Chambers said the Road Safety Authority (RSA) had informed him that, since the appointment of an additional 75 driving testers, waiting times had steadily reduced and that a waiting time of 10 weeks would be “restored by the middle of the year”.
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However, the briefing for Mr Lawless — prepared at the end of June — shows that this has still not happened, with the waiting time standing at 15.6 weeks.
The document says: “While this is still above the service level agreement target of 10 weeks, significant progress has been made since last August.”
It says the service is “facing unprecedented demand” and progress was made through the sanctioning of 75 additional temporary driver testing posts.
According to the document, the RSA has leave to employ up to 205 driver testers and at the end of May the number of full-time testers employed was 162.
Some 55,996 people were waiting for their invitation to book their driving test at the end of May and a further 17,510 people had a scheduled test date.
The document puts the increased demand down to factors, including an increase in learner permits in circulation, increased capacity in the Driver Theory Test, and an increase in instructors’ capacity to deliver driving lessons.
In a statement, the RSA said driving test applications increased by 31 per cent in the year to date and that It has “consistently expressed the need for more permanent testers over the past two years”.
It added that the recruitment panel for the 75 temporary testers “has been exhausted in 2024, given the temporary nature of these roles, particularly within high employment urban centres of Dublin and Cork, where demand for driving tests is significant”.
The statement said: “Despite this, our driver testing team has continued to work extensively to address the backlog and has delivered 43 per cent more tests a year to date.”
The RSA has “submitted a business case to the Department of Transport for the recruitment of new, permanent driver testers to deliver the 10-week service level against the new service demands. Until such approval of this request, it is not possible to accurately predict when the service will return to agreed service levels.”
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