Michael Collins (Cork South-West, Independent Ireland Party)
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216. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport if a driving test for a person (details supplied) will be expedited; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [1076/25]

Michael Collins (Cork South-West, Independent Ireland Party)
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223. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport if a driving test for a person (details supplied) will be expedited; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [1107/25]

Michael Collins (Cork South-West, Independent Ireland Party)
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258. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport if a driving retest for a person (details supplied) who has been waiting 14 weeks for a driving test, will be expedited, as the person is a trainee teacher and needs their car to commence placement; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [1538/25]

James Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail)
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Under the Road Safety Authority Act 2006, the Road Safety Authority (RSA) has statutory responsibility for the National Driver Testing Service, including application and scheduling matters. Neither I nor my Department have the power to intervene in individual cases. Given the RSA's responsibility in this matter, I have referred the Deputy's questions to the RSA for direct, detailed reply. Please contact my private office if a response is not received within ten days.

Pending this detailed response, the Deputy may wish to note that a change was made to the test online booking system in October 2023 to allow any unused slots to be made available for anyone to take up at short notice. If a driving test is cancelled at short notice, the RSA now make this appointment available to the general public on the portal .

Colm Burke (Cork North-Central, Fine Gael)
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217. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the action he is taking to reduce the waiting time for driving re-test appointments at a test centre (details supplied), in view that re-test appointments are extending beyond the ten-week wait period to 15 to 19 weeks; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [1089/25]

Eoghan Kenny (Cork North-Central, Labour)
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224. To ask the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport what actions his Department or the RSA are taking in order to reduce the backlog in waiting times for drivers who are booking a re-test; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [1125/25]

James Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail)
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Under the Road Safety Authority Act 2006, the Road Safety Authority (RSA) has statutory responsibility for the National Driver Testing Service. This includes all application and scheduling matters.

Given the RSA's responsibility in this matter, I have referred the Deputy's question to the RSA for direct, detailed reply. Please contact my private office if a response is not received within ten days.

Pending this detailed response, to address the issue of driving test waiting times, in September 2024 my Department sanctioned an additional 70 permanent positions for driver testers. This increases the total permanent sanction for driver testers to 200, which represents a doubling of the comparable sanction of 100 posts in June 2022 in just over two years.

As a condition of sanction for these additional resources, my officials have requested that a plan is put in place to restore waiting times to 10 weeks as soon as possible. I understand that recruitment is well underway and additional capacity will enter the service in the coming months, helping to progressively reduce waiting times.