Les Smith Haulage returns to Mercedes-Benz
Les Smith Haulage has bought its first Mercedes-Benz vehicles in six years.
News - Commercial Motor
December 6, 2016
The DVSA is to gauge how practical it would be for external assessors to carry out Driver CPC practical demonstrations.
From early December to early January 2017 it will trial whether it would be possible to outsource part four of the Driver CPC assessment, which includes vehicle walk-around checks and safe loading, to a third party.
The DVSA still plans to offer the test itself, but said opening up assessments to other providers would allow vocational drivers more choice over where they wanted to take it, and would maintain the current national waiting time for an HGV driving test.
It has not named the third parties taking part in the trial, but a DVSA spokesman told Commercialmotor.com that it is using 20 training providers during the pilot, which were were initially selected through their involvement in its Vocational Testing and Training Advisory Group (VTTAG) stake holder meeting, or by being nominated by a VTTAG member. Any unfilled places were then offered more widely by DVSA.
The agency introduced new questions to the examination from last Thursday (1 December) in order to keep up to date with technology such as digital tachographs and make the questions easier to understand.
However, the DVSA stressed that the questions are still based around the information supplied in its official learning materials.
Earlier this year the government said it planned to make Driver CPC more flexible, but the nature of the changes depended on the outcome of Brexit negotiations.
The DVSA is to also stop sending out Driver Qualification Cards immediately to drivers who complete their Driver CPC training more than a year before their deadline.
