Privatised driving tests to end next month

DRIVING TESTS will no longer be provided by SGS Ireland from next month.

The decision to end the service for the Road Safety Authority (RSA) comes just months into an agreement in which the private company was to carry out up to 70,000 tests this year.

A spokeswoman for SGS Ireland confirmed the company would cease driver testing on April 10th but declined to provide a reason. SGS employs 26 driver testers on a contract basis and these employees are expected to be laid off.

The absence of a private testing company to meet spikes in demand places the RSA and the Minister for Transport Noel Dempsey under pressure to maintain their commitment to an average waiting time of 10 weeks or less for a test.

At the start of the year the RSA went to the Labour Relations Commission (LRC) to secure the option of privatised driving tests for 2009 in the face of strong opposition from unions representing testers and staff employed by the State.

Since July last year the waiting time has been around 10 weeks and at the start of February there were 53,000 people waiting for a test. On March 9th the average waiting time was 9.5 weeks. A number of centres, notably Tallaght at 17 weeks and Nenagh, Tralee, Thurles, Tullamore and Wicklow on 14 weeks, are well over the 10 week target.

It is the expected the RSA will seek a replacement company to provide additional driving tests due to the long lead in time require to train testers and the fact that the LRC-brokered agreement with the unions stipulated 2009 was to be the final year of outsourcing.

A spokesman for the RSA was unable to confirm if SGS had walked away from the contract or provide a reason why the agreement had been terminated.

SGS Ireland is part of the Swiss-based multinational SGS and provides the national car test through its subsidiary, National Car Testing Service Ltd (NCTS).

NCTS was unsuccessful in its bid to retain the ten-year car testing contract following a tender process last year in which Spanish multinational testing and services group Applus RTD emerged victorious. Applus will start car testing from January next year.