Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 5 November 2013
1266. Deputy Michael Healy-Rae asked the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport his views on the impact that the centralising of the new driving licences and taking them away from the local post office will cause persons who live in rural areas who will have to travel long distances to renew and apply for their driver's license; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [46095/13]
View answer1286. Deputy Dara Calleary asked the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport the person responsible for the selection of centres for the new National Driver Licence Service; if his attention has been drawn to the inconvenience being caused to drivers by the limited number of centres; the reason there is no centre in Ballina County Mayo when the Road Safety Authority has a large HQ building in the town; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [46875/13]
View answer1296. Deputy John Deasy asked the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport if his attention has been drawn to the inconvenience caused by the restriction of the new driving licence renewal technology to just 34 sites countrywide; if there are plans to increase the number of National Driver Licence Service identity verification locations; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [47097/13]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 1266, 1286 and 1296 together.
Under the terms of the Road Safety Authority (Commercial Vehicle Roadworthiness) Act 2012, the Road Safety Authority (RSA) became the national driver licensing authority as of January this year. Also with effect from 19 January, the new plastic card form of driving licence was introduced in all EU Member States. Between 19 January and 25 October, local authorities continued to provide customer services relating to driving licences on behalf of the RSA.
On 29 October last, the RSA assumed full responsibility for the service. The RSA designed the new centralised driver licensing system around a central unit within the Authority and three outsourced contracts. The contracts include one for a front office service, which engages with the public; a second contract for a back office service, to process applications; and a third contract for the production of the plastic card licence. These contracts were awarded by the RSA following competitive procurement processes, in which neither my Department or I had any role. There is no suggestion of taking this business away from post offices as An Post never had any involvement in direct customer services for driving licences. They did tender for the service but were unsuccessful.
The RSA awarded the contract for front office services to SGS (Ireland) Ltd., who will operate 34 full-time and 2 part-time offices. The new network of offices will be open Monday through Saturday and have longer opening hours than the previous local authority operations to facilitate people who may not be able to apply for their licence during normal working hours. Furthermore, people will be able use any of the offices to apply/renew their licence rather than as previously, just the centre in their own county. The target is to process driver licence applications within 8 days.
It is important to also state that the requirement to attend in person only occurs once, when the person first receives their new plastic drivers licence when the person's image is captured through the SAFE 2 system and they have their identity verified. This is an important measure to prevent fraud. After attending once in person, people can renew their licence through the post and are not required to attend in person again.
