Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether he plans to provide further support to the DVLA to reduce the backlog of expired driving licences that are awaiting for renewal; and if he will further extend expired driving licences until that backlog has been reduced.

The Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency’s (DVLA) online services are the quickest and easiest way to renew a driving licence. There are no delays in successful online applications and customers should receive their driving licence within a few days.

However, many people still choose or have to make a paper application for a driving licence. The DVLA receives around 60,000 items of mail every day which must be dealt with in person. Ongoing industrial action by members of the Public and Commercial Services union is leading to delays for customers who make paper applications.

The DVLA continues to look into opportunities to reduce the backlog and Ministers regularly review progress. The DVLA has been developing additional new online services and recruiting additional staff. The DVLA is exploring the possibility of securing extra office space to house more staff to work predominantly on driver’s medical casework and queries. This will be surge capacity accommodation and resource to help reduce backlogs while providing future resilience and business continuity.

Currently, paper applications are likely to take between six and ten weeks to process. There may be additional delays in processing more complex transactions, for example, if medical investigations are needed as part of a driving licence application. The latest information on turnaround times for paper driving licence applications can be found here.

All driving licences that expired between 1 February and 31 December 2020 were extended for 11 months to help drivers at the height of the pandemic. There are no plans to introduce any further extension to driving licences.