Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what progress is being made by her Department on obtaining Home Office Type Approval for mobile evidential breath testing equipment.

The Government recognises that drink driving is a serious threat to road safety and shares the police’s desire to have roadside evidential breath test instruments available for use.

That is why the Home Office, Department for Transport and the police have been working with manufacturers towards the Type Approval of a new generation of Mobile Evidential Breath Test Instruments (MEBTI) as soon as practicably possible. Type approval is a complex process and relies on the submission by manufacturers of instruments which then perform satisfactorily during testing. The Home Office has no control over these factors.