Vehicle Drivers (Certificates of Professional Competence) (Amendment) Regulations 2024

Currently, drivers renew their certificates of professional competence every five years to drive in the UK or the EU, by doing 35 hours of training through a rigid system of courses, with little e-learning as an option. We are introducing a national qualification to sit alongside the existing international qualification. The national qualification, which will be valid across the United Kingdom, will still require 35 hours of training every five years, but courses can be shorter, with a minimum of three and a half hours, and there will be more e-learning available, with new stand-alone e-learning courses being introduced—something that is not currently available. This flexibility was something that many in the industry, particularly drivers, have requested.

We are also introducing an accelerated pathway to allow drivers to return to the workforce. If a driver’s certificate of professional competence has lapsed by more than 60 days but less than two years, the driver can take a seven-hour bespoke return-to-driving course to a gain a one-year national CPC. This window of time was chosen to avoid drivers deliberately allowing their CPC to lapse in order to take the accelerated return pathway and to prevent drivers who have been out of the profession for a prolonged time rejoining without adequate training. Within the 12-month validity period of their national CPC, the driver can then do the remaining 28 hours of training to regain a full five-year national or international CPC.

I am aware that some in the industry would have liked to abolish the CPC entirely. While I sympathise with drivers who see it as a burden, based on time and cost to renew, I believe that it is absolutely necessary, for reasons of road safety and driver professionalism. Additionally, due to the requirements of the trade and co-operation agreement with the EU and other international obligations, the CPC must be kept for most commercial international road freight and passenger transport.

These reforms will make renewing or regaining a CPC much easier and more flexible for operators, but particularly for drivers, easing the impact on work/life balance, while not reducing the quality of the education drivers receive, to maintain a safe and highly professional workforce in the road freight and passenger transport sectors.

These changes to the Vehicle Drivers (Certificates of Professional Competence) Regulations will make the renewal process more flexible for drivers operating solely in the UK and help to reduce the chances of future driver shortages. We listened to stakeholders in all four nations while developing the amendments, and we expect the amendments to support the industry while ensuring a professional and safe workforce throughout the UK and beyond.

To help the industry to understand the more flexible training route, the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency in Britain and the Driver and Vehicle Agency in Northern Ireland will issue guidance to the industry on these changes. I therefore beg to move that the House approve these regulations.

The CPC is personal to the driver, not the operator. That is a long-standing problem, and it is not clear to me that the Minister can do anything about it. He has claimed that these regulations and the CPC are all about raising standards and professionalising the HGV driving trade, and I am at one with him on that. However, we are still not treating HGV drivers as well as we should, given their importance to sustaining our way of life. We saw this when we literally ran out of HGV drivers a few years ago, as the Minister observed.

The noble Lord, Lord Moylan, had it exactly right that, if you drive in the EU, you will need the EU certificate of professional competence. The EU, as I understand it, is considering introducing reforms, but it is not as fast as we are, so it is unlikely to recognise this national CPC in the near future. These reforms are necessary, however, and good things to do anyway.

Lastly, the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, referred to safety. Driving a heavy vehicle of any sort is a professional job and it needs to be safe. There has been a lot of consideration about the nature of this training. I agree with the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, that it is a good thing, despite the opposition to it from some people—a few operators and some drivers. Apart from anything else, as I can testify, you can hold one of these licences for a long time. I passed my PCV test in July 1974 and, until these regulations first came into effect about 10 years ago, I did not need to do a single day’s further training. If you think about the possibilities of driving either a vehicle like the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, does, or the modest public passenger-carrying vehicles that I drive, that is extraordinary. It is absolutely right that people who follow these professions should get periodic training. They should be reminded of the serious consequences of breaking regulations on drivers’ hours, of not complying with the Highway Code and of a number of other things—including, if I put my railway hat on, the possibility of tall vehicles striking railway bridges—all of which are covered in this training. In addition, in the case of passenger-carrying vehicles, dealing with passengers is covered properly.

It is very good to hear that all sides of your Lordships’ House support this. We are not going to abolish the qualification. I can attest, as I said, to the focus on road safety, that the CPC brings, and I beg to move that these regulations are adopted.