Steve Jordan

12/09/2026

Duty Calls
RAC leads calls for fuel duty rises to be scrapped as petrol and diesel prices surge
Published on September 10, 2026

Drilling down
The RAC says the average price of unleaded petrol has risen by 5p a litre in just one week to 167.17p, while diesel has increased by the same amount to 188.63p.

The latest rises mean filling a typical family car costs around £2.75 more than it did just a week earlier.

These increases have followed a sharp rise in crude oil prices, with the price of a barrel averaging around $96 over the past week.

Brent crude subsequently climbed above $100 on Wednesday as attacks on shipping and energy infrastructure intensified after the US attacked Iranian tankers, and Iran retaliated.

The conflict has raised fears about further disruption to supplies passing through the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most important oil transit routes.

Reuters reported that traffic through the strait has fallen sharply following attacks involving the US and Iran, while uncertainty over how much oil is being transported has added a further risk premium to prices.

Fuelling costs
Higher crude prices feed into wholesale petrol and diesel costs, which are then reflected at forecourts.

However, motorists also pay significant tax on every litre purchased.

Fuel duty on petrol and diesel is currently 52.95p a litre, while VAT at 20% is also charged on fuel, including on the duty element.

RAC senior policy officer Rod Dennis said the latest increases demonstrated how vulnerable British motorists were to international events.

“The latest price rises throw into sharp focus just how exposed UK drivers can be to events thousands of miles away,” he said.

Dennis added that there was now a “very strong case” for keeping fuel duty at its current level until at least the end of the Parliament, warning that households were already facing cost-of-living pressures.

12/09/2026

Plate It Up
New roads policing team to target illegal number plates
Published on September 7, 2026

Registering change
The new National Roads Policing Coordination Centre (NRPCC) will bring police forces across England together to share intelligence, technology and data, with illegal number plates among its priorities.

It’s an initiative intended to make it harder for drivers to evade speeding, parking and clean-air-zone penalties, but also to prevent criminals using vehicles that police cameras cannot easily identify.

The DfT says illegal plates are increasingly being used to frustrate automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) systems.

These include cloned registrations, where a vehicle is given the registration of another legitimate car, and so-called ‘ghost’ or ‘stealth’ plates designed to make characters difficult or impossible for cameras to read.

Main course
The scale of the problem is difficult to quantify because the Government does not routinely collect figures showing how many illegal plates are in use.

However, DVLA figures highlight the impact of number plate cloning on innocent motorists.

In 2024, the DVLA received 10,461 reports from members of the public who had received correspondence, fines or penalties relating to vehicles they did not recognise or accept responsibility for.

That compared with 7,377 reports in 2020, representing an increase of more than 40%.

There were a further 9,385 reports in the first 10 months of 2025.

The Government cautions that not all of these cases necessarily involve cloning, as some may result from administrative errors.

12/09/2026

Driving test pass rate breaks 50% as record testing levels fail to clear backlog
Published on September 10, 2026

Positive results
Figures covering April 2025 to March 2026 show that 1,000,043 candidates passed their practical test, compared with 998,578 who failed, resulting in an overall pass rate just above 50%.

That compares with an average pass rate of 45%-47% in recent decades.

The increase comes alongside record levels of testing, with the DVSA conducting approximately 2.169 million car practical tests during 2025/26, compared with 1.96 million the previous year.

That is around 200,000 more tests and comfortably above its target of 1.975 million.

However, the increase in supply has barely shifted the backlog.

Queueing up
The DVSA’s official annual report records a national waiting-time figure of 21.5 weeks in March 2026, only marginally better than 21.9 weeks the previous year.

Its target remains seven weeks; however, its latest accounts now state that “no date set” to achieve it.

The DVSA says the fundamental problem is that demand remains higher than capacity and is difficult to predict.

It estimates that another 450,000 to 500,000 tests above normal capacity are needed to return waiting times to target levels, representing a backlog that could take another 18 months to work through.

Examiner numbers have also increased.

The active car driving examiner workforce reached approximately 1,604 full-time equivalents in March 2026, a 7% increase year-on-year and the highest level since 2018.

The DVSA has also introduced incentives to encourage additional testing and improve retention, while using qualified Ministry of Defence examiners to provide extra capacity.

05/09/2026

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05/09/2026

03/09/2026

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26/08/2026

A new form of roadside surveillance technology is being marketed to law enforcement that could allow investigators to identify and track vehicles, and potentially the people travelling in them.

This new tech can pick up information through the electronic devices drivers and passengers are carrying in their vehicle.

As we all become more digitally attached, it opens up a new world of authority tracking, for better or worse!

More than a number
SignalTrace, developed by Leonardo’s ELSAG security division, is designed to work alongside automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) systems.

Rather than relying solely on a vehicle’s registration, the technology detects signals emitted by nearby electronic devices, including smartphones, smartwatches, Bluetooth devices, RFID tags and some vehicle components.

Leonardo says SignalTrace can identify groups of devices that regularly travel together and create an “electronic fingerprint” from their recurring signals.

That fingerprint can then be correlated with licence-plate records and locations, allowing investigators to search for a vehicle or group of devices even when they do not initially know its registration.

General specifics
The company says the system does not decrypt or read the contents of communications.

Instead, it collects electronic identifiers already being broadcast by devices and uses patterns of association and movement to generate investigative leads.

In practice, that could mean a person who regularly travels in the same car as a colleague has their phone and smartwatch repeatedly recorded alongside the vehicle’s registration.

If one of those devices later appears alongside another vehicle of interest to police, the recurring electronic signature could provide an investigative link.

Leonardo’s UK operation describes the technology as a form of Vehicle Electronic Signature Recognition, or digital fingerprinting, capable of collecting information from devices to help identify vehicles. It says the technology can provide post-event analysis as well as real-time intelligence.

21/08/2026

More than 60,000 practical driving tests were cancelled due to examiners’ medical absences during 2025/26.

The findings add another challenge for learners and driving instructors already struggling with limited test availability.

For the DVSA, under pressure to cut waiting times, it underlines the issues of staff morale and workloads.

Not today, thank you
Analysis of DVSA data by learner-driver insurance specialist Tempcover found that 101,423 practical tests were cancelled between April 2025 and March 2026.

Although this was 16% lower than the 120,710 cancellations recorded in 2024/25, the total remained almost 36% higher than a decade ago, when 74,693 tests were cancelled.

Examiner sickness and medical appointments accounted for 60,092 cancellations, or 59% of the annual total.

A further 29,438 tests were cancelled because examiners were on leave, while 11,884 were disrupted by acts of nature, including severe weather.

Nine cancellations were attributed to disputes.

For the driver-training industry, the figures highlight how problems with examiner availability can directly impact carefully planned training programmes.

A short-notice cancellation can leave an instructor with a test-day lesson to rearrange, while learners may have to wait weeks or months for another appointment.

Pupils who have reached test standard may also need additional lessons to maintain their skills while waiting for a replacement.

Much of the DVSA’s focus on test cancellations has been on candidate cancellations, whereas the figures paint a different picture.

21/08/2026

Motorists have been urged to “stay in their lane” rather than take matters into their own hands when confronted with drivers who hog the middle lane of motorways.

Centre Lane Only Driver (CLODS) have sparked a series of TikTok videos in which a content creator held up signs telling middle-lane drivers to move over.

The video has attracted more than 83,000 likes and thousands of comments, highlighting how strongly the issue resonates with motorists.

Persistent issue
The problem of drivers who hog the middle lane rather than move to the left lane after overtaking has been highlighted by the police, road safety experts and motoring organisations as an increasingly disruptive, congestion-stimulating and potentially dangerous habit.

However, road safety experts have warned that attempting to educate other drivers while on the move can create additional risks, particularly at motorway speeds.

Graham Conway, managing director of Select Car Leasing, said middle-lane hogging was one of the biggest frustrations for UK motorists, but warned against confronting offenders.

“Chastising other road-users about their driving standards is ill-advised at best and potentially dangerous at worst,” he said.

“You run the risk of getting yourself into a road rage altercation if others don’t take kindly to your advice, however well-meaning it might be.”

He also warned that attempts to attract another driver’s attention could distract them while travelling at up to 70mph.

15/08/2026

August has recorded the highest average number of drink-drive casualties and collisions of any month over the past decade.

That’s according to analysis by the RAC.

It challenges the widely held perception that Christmas is the most dangerous time of year for alcohol-related road crashes.

Season’s Greetings
RAC analysis of newly released Government data covering Great Britain between 2014 and 2024 found that August averaged 721 drink-drive casualties from 485 collisions each year. J

July was close behind, with an average of 704 casualties and 474 collisions.

By comparison, December – traditionally associated with Christmas parties, festive celebrations and warnings about drink-driving – recorded an annual average of 663 casualties from 459 collisions.

The figures suggest that the risk increases significantly during the warmer months. Between June and August, there were on average 16% more drink-drive casualties than during the winter period from December to February. Drink-drive collisions were also 16% higher during summer.

The trend was still evident in the latest figures. In 2024, June recorded the highest number of drink-drive casualties and collisions, with 650 casualties and 440 collisions. Across June, July and August, there were 1,810 casualties and 1,220 collisions, compared with 1,570 casualties and 1,060 collisions during December, January and February.