More than 72,000 people are currently waiting for driving tests including an increase of 10,000 in the past three months alone, the Dáil has heard.
Sinn Féin transport spokesman Pa Daly said the numbers waiting for a test had risen by 60 per cent since 2022, with 72,414 currently on the waiting list.
Average test waiting time is 22 weeks with the longest at 35 weeks in Navan, Co Meath, while a maximum of 10 weeks is the target.
Mr Daly said “this crisis has been rumbling on for years”, and that every TD had heard from constituents who were “facing interminable delays”.
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He said people “are trapped in outrageously expensive insurance policies, having to pay more and more for driving lessons” and unable to take up jobs or courses because they did not have reliable or any public transport, particularly in rural areas.
The Kerry TD hit out at the Government parties’ “continued failure to address this”, and said the Independents supporting Government were “highly critical of these delays when they were in opposition” but “forgot” to include it in the programme for government.
Mr Daly was speaking as he introduced a private member’s motion on driving test waiting times calling for urgent Government action to expedite the recruitment of additional permanent driving test instructors.
The motion also calls for an urgent review of the Road Safety Authority’s (RSA) capacity to address the backlog, and to urgently identify sites for additional driving test centres.
Minister for Transport Darragh O’Brien acknowledged waiting times “are far in excess of what is acceptable”, and that they have been “trending in the wrong direction”. The Government did not oppose the Sinn Féin motion and the Minister expected “to see progress in the coming months”.
He is prioritising waiting times in his dealings with the RSA board, management and new chair Anne Graham who he appointed on Tuesday. The 10 weeks' waiting time “is an important target and one that the RSA should meet and need to deliver on”.
He said rising waiting times have been driver by population growth and increasing demand and the Covid-19 pandemic. Last year was the busiest in the history of the service with just under 275,000 test applications, 10 per cent above RSA projections. Over 250,000 tests were delivered last year.
A recruitment drive for 70 additional permanent testers is at an advanced stage and offers are being made, and the number of testers sanctioned had doubled from 100 to 200 since 2022.
Sinn Féin Louth TD Joanna Byrne said Drogheda was the largest town in Ireland but has no driving test centres. Across the country test centres were operating out of offices and rooms in hotels but the Government “can’t seem to locate a single building in Drogheda that would be suitable for a test centre”.
Labour’s Alan Kelly asked if the RSA assessed the pass and fail rate of testers as he highlighted “a massive fail rate” by one tester in Co Tipperary. He cited cases of applicants who sat the test three times and failed but went to Birr in Co Offaly and passed.
Social Democrats TD Jennifer Whitmore said that in March 2024 the Department of Transport promised the waiting times would be reduced to 10 weeks, but she said that since the 70 permanent roles had been sanctioned in September the 175 testers had reduced to 151. Waiting times had gone from an average of 18 weeks to 22 weeks, and in her Wicklow constituency it is 26 weeks.
