I beg to move,

That, for the purposes of any Act resulting from the Driving Instruction (Suspension and Exemption Powers) Bill, it is expedient to authorise—

(1) the imposition of fees in connection with exemptions from prohibitions concerning registration, and

(2) payments into the Consolidated Fund.

I kept my remarks on the money resolution brief, but I also put on record our thanks to the constituent of Willie Rennie, Lesley Anne Steele, in coming forward in what must have been difficult circumstances, and thereby bringing this matter forward to where we have reached today.

For the purposes of any Act resulting from the Driving Instruction (Suspension and Exemption Powers) Bill, it is expedient to provide a power in uncommenced provisions in the Road Safety Act 2006 to charge a fee for the costs incurred as a result of the exemption arrangements that enable partially qualified driving instructors to provide instruction for payment. The Bill amends uncommenced provisions in the 2006 Act, in particular those affecting sections 124 and 129 of the Road Traffic Act 1988. Section 129 enables trainee driving instructors to apply for a licence that permits them to offer instruction for payment. The registrar of approved driving instructors, who is an employee of the Driving Standards Agency, may charge a fee in connection with such an application—that fee currently stands at £140 per licence granted.

The existing trainee licence scheme is quite rigid in terms of its entry requirements. Applicants must have passed the first two of the three approved driving instructor qualifying tests. However, the 2006 Act envisaged more flexible qualifying arrangements for trainee instructors. Trainee instructors will obtain practical experience of providing tuition through the granting of exemptions from the requirement to be registered, as provided for in the uncommenced provisions of the 2006 Act. Unfortunately, that Act does not provide for a fee to be charged in connection with these exemption arrangements. The DSA needs to be able to continue charging trainee driving instructors a fee in connection with applications to give paid instruction while working towards admittance to the register of qualified instructors.

If the DSA were unable to pass on to applicants its costs for processing those exemption requests, they would fall on the agency's other customers and I am sure that the House would agree that that would be unfair. Alternatively, the DSA would not commence the new provisions and would continue to rely on the existing trainee licence regime. That would deny trainee driving instructors the more flexible qualifying arrangements envisaged in the 2006 Act.

We shall be introducing an amendment to the Bill to provide for the charging of fees in connection with the exemption from this registration. It is intended to replace the fee-charging provision that supports the existing trainee licence scheme. It is for this reason that the Ways And Means resolution is being introduced and, on that basis, I commend the resolution to the House.

This Ways and Means resolution is eminently sensible. We need an arrangement in place whereby we can assess the trainee driving instructors as well as the registered ones, because it is pointless to do one part of this without addressing the full picture. I am grateful to the Minister for introducing the resolution, because it will allow us to have a much more comprehensive package of registration arrangements to ensure that people are fit and proper to be driving instructors in one way or another.

Question put and agreed to.