Once again the early peaceful morning is shattered by the howls of indignation from the current Mrs Dealer. My mind races through the various things she might have stumble upon when making her way from the marital bed to the kitchen:
· my muddy shoeprints on the beige carpet after walking the dog
· red wine on the aforementioned flooring
· burglary and/or burglar (for whom I would fear…)
· milk left out over night after making relaxing cocoa last evening in an ad break while watching Endeavour
No, none of these. It’s the radio and the news, and presumably the lad John Humphrys. He does like to make the blood that runs through Mrs Dealer’s veins and arteries boil irrespective of the subject matter.
“End to driving tests in foreign languages,” repeats Mrs Dealer. This sort of thing drives her mad. The United Kingdom is already well on its way to becoming a small island off the coast of Europe, this measure will only be the latest instalment of general discrimination, she mutters from under the hair net.
From now on driving tests will only be allowed to be taken in English and Welsh. The reason is to improve safety and clamp down on fraud, explained roads minister Stephen Hammond.
The phrase missing in that sentence is ‘without spending any money’, declares a riled Mrs Dealer as she seeks the supermarket bran flakes from the cupboard.
This decision is said to reflect concerns about interpreters helping candidates cheat on their theory tests by feeding them the correct answers. Since 2008, more than 1,300 theory test passes have been revoked after investigations into fraudulent interpreters.
To put this ‘1,300’ into context, between 1st April 2011 and 31st March 2012 there were 1.74million driving and riding tests. In 2013 more than 93,000 car driving theory tests were sat in a choice of 19 foreign languages – that is approximately 5%. And of those 93,000 individuals, based on the government’s own figures, just 260 a year have been ‘revoked’. A whole 0.3%.
Yet according to the DVSA stats “between February 2008 and December 2009, more than 20% of all theory tests taken with an interpreter were found to be fraudulent, with one interpreter conducting 586 fraudulent tests. Last year, two interpreters were each jailed for 12 months for helping learners cheat on their tests”.
The numbers don’t add up and clearly policing it is has proved very time consuming, costly and unrewarding. And without the big hit the figures would have been even less convincing.
Mrs Dealer strongly believes that the biggest danger to Britain’s roads is fat, middle-aged, balding men in powerful cars that are well beyond their driving capabilities, and not those who speak other languages. Something she regularly highlights when driving down the motorway.
The car hogging your mirror is usually driven by a fat, middle-aged, balding man, the car cutting you up is usually driven by a fat, middle-aged, balding man, and car ignoring speed limits is usually driven by a fat, middle-aged, balding man.
Needless to say, I respected braking distances and speed limits en route to the used truck emporium of wonder and affordable deals.
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