The Motor Vehicles (Driving Licences) Regulations 1987

Nature of tests

20.—(1) Subject to the following provisions of this regulation, the test which a person is required to pass before a licence can be granted to him authorising him to drive a motor vehicle of a class included in any particular group shall be a test carried out on a vehicle of that class which satisfies the person conducting the test:—

(a) that the person taking the test is fully conversant with the contents of the Highway Code;

(b) generally that the person taking the test is competent to drive, without danger to and with due consideration for other users of the road, the vehicle on which he is tested; and

(c) that the person taking the test is able to comply with such of the additional requirements specified in Schedule 4 as are referred to in the third column of Schedule 3 in relation to the group which includes the class of vehicle on which he is tested; and

(d) in the case of a licence to drive a motor bicycle (without a side-car) of any class included in group D, that the person taking the test is able to execute the manoeuvres specified in Schedule 5 competently:

Provided that the person conducting the test may be satisfied as to the matters specified in this paragraph where he concludes that the person being tested should only be passed in relation to vehicles of a particular construction or design despite the fact that the test was not conducted on a vehicle of that construction or design.

(2) The test which a person is required to pass as prescribed in paragraph (1) before a licence authorising him to drive a motor bicycle (without a side-car) of any class included in group D can be granted to him, shall be divided into two separate parts referred to in these Regulations as Part I and Part II of the test for motor bicycles.

(3) Part I of the test for motor bicycles shall satisfy the person conducting the test as to the matter specified in sub-paragraph (d) of paragraph (1) and Part II of the test shall satisfy the person conducting the test as to the other matters specified in that paragraph.

(4) A person may not submit himself for Part II of the test for motor bicycles unless he has, within five years of the date he applies for the appointment for that part of the test, passed Part I of the test for motor bicycles, and unless he complies with paragraph (3) of regulation 22.

(5) Nothing in sub-paragraph (d) of paragraph (1) or paragraph (2), (3) or (4) shall apply in the case of a person who at the time he applies for an appointment for a test is resident in an island outside the mainland of Great Britain other than—

(a) any of the following islands, namely, the Isle of Wight, Lewis and Harris, North Uist, Benbecula and South Uist, Mainland Orkney, Mainland Shetland and Skye; or

(b) an island from which motor vehicles, not constructed for special purposes, can at some time be conveniently driven to a road in any part of the mainland of Great Britain, or in an island mentioned at (a) above, because of the presence of a bridge, tunnel, ford, or other way suitable for the passage of such motor vehicles.

(6) A person who has passed a test to drive vehicles of a class included in any particular group shall be deemed for the purposes of the 1972 Act and of these Regulations competent to drive, in addition to vehicles of a class included in that particular group, also vehicles of a class included in any other group which is referred to in the fourth column of Schedule 3 as being an additional group in relation to that particular group.

(7) In paragraph (6), the reference to a test does not include a reference to Part I of the test for motor bicycles.