To ask the Minister for Infrastructure what urgent changes she intends to make to ensure there is enough human resource to manage the increasing demand for urgent MOTs.

There has been a gradual resumption of MOT services from 1 June 2020, when the Driver & Vehicle Agency (DVA) resumed Individual Vehicle Approval testing.

From 20 July, the Driver and Vehicle Agency resumed MOT testing, at all test centres, for priority vehicle groups, including those vehicles that are not able to avail of a Temporary Exemption Certificate (TEC). This includes taxis and buses due a first time test, vehicles not previously registered in Northern Ireland, vehicles whose MOTs have expired by more than 12 months that includes vehicles previously declared SORN and those sold by car dealerships.

From 1 September, MOT testing for four year old cars and motorbikes and three year old light goods vehicles also resumed and for those vehicles in this category that currently have a 6 month TEC, they will be called for test when their TEC expires. In addition, the DVA recommenced testing of heavy goods vehicles, trailers and buses.

TECs will continue to be automatically generated from DVA’s system for all eligible vehicles that the DVA does not have the capacity to test at this time.

It is my priority to ensure that our staff and customers remain safe and the DVA will continue to be guided by the latest public health advice to ensure that necessary and proportionate control measures relating to Covid-19 are incorporated into its risk assessments for safe vehicle testing. Like many other public facing services, vehicle testing capacity will increase as restrictions ease and as risk assessments are updated.

My officials continue to carefully monitor staffing levels to ensure there is sufficient capacity to meet the increasing demand for vehicle testing across its test centre network.

The DVA is in the process of recruiting additional temporary and permanent vehicle examiners and is keeping its staffing levels under review.