Dr Thérèse Coffey (Suffolk Coastal) (Con):...I have a particular
pet project for the Department for Transport, which the Transport
Secretary well knows. People who passed their driving test before
1997 can drive a D1, which is basically a minibus not for hire,
and a C1, which is a typical Tesco or Ocado delivery
van; they are also used by many other firms, like Amazon,
DPD and so on. A European regulation then
required people to undertake the expensive tests needed for HGVs.
I think that is unnecessary. At the time, I guess it must have
been a Labour Government, or perhaps it was still a Conservative
one; I cannot quite remember—[Interruption.] I apologise: it must
have been a Conservative Government who thankfully negotiated to
keep grandfather rights. I say that we should get on and repeal
this unnecessary law, as that would allow many more people into
the market to drive these sort of vans. This is a particular
issue for rural communities, which do not have extensive public
transport, because so much community transport relies on
volunteers to drive minibuses so that people can get to a variety
of activities, and those areas are currently having to pay quite
a lot of money to train people to do that. This is a really easy
win. I keep being told that primary legislation would be
required, but let us do that, if that is what is needed to boost
that aspect of productivity...
