Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether her Department is assessing the potential use of Home Office-approved roadside evidential drug testing devices to replace laboratory analysis for specified drug driving offences.

The Department has recently consulted on possible reforms to strengthen enforcement against drink and drug driving, including temporary licence suspension-type measures for suspected offenders before a case is concluded. The consultation has now closed and responses are being analysed.

Existing legislation already provides for courts to impose disqualification in appropriate cases, including as part of sentence. It also provides for interim disqualification in specified circumstances after conviction where an offence involving obligatory or discretionary disqualification has not yet been finally dealt with. Sentencing and disqualification decisions in individual cases are matters for the independent courts.

For drug-driving offences, the current evidential framework relies on blood analysis for specified-limit offences. The Department has also consulted on possible future changes to drink and drug-driving enforcement and has supported exploratory work on roadside evidential drug-testing capability, including the Mobile Evidential Drug Testing Instrument (MEDTI) Demonstrator. Any change to evidential testing arrangements would require further scientific, legal and operational consideration.