Had my class 2 entitlement revoked nearly twelve months now, but despite not being ill and with two all clear medicals and an angiogram that confirmed I was well the DVLA are still dragging their feet.
In a recent letter they informed me of the latest stalling tactic, but went on to state I could challenge their decision in the Majistrates Court, anyone been through that?. PM if your prefer.
Bit of history on my case:
viewtopic.php?f=12&t=70800
The problems you are experiencing seem to be procedural delays, rather than receiving a final decision about your medical fitness that could only be challenged in court . As I read it, your surgeon has confirmed that the angiogram you had done revealed no need for further stents, there is therefore no mandatory waiting period before you can meet the Group 2 medical standards and that the seemingly adverse exercise ECG readings have been confirmed by the angiogram and other tests as a false positive.
The problem you face is that the DVLA will say that they prefer the evidence of their own independent experts, likely claiming that their experts have specific experience in driving matters and are not tainted by possible bias towards their own patients.
Clearly there is ongoing delay in getting DVLA’s experts and Drivers Medical Branch to deal with the case. If you go for a court hearing at this stage, that could well close off any possibility of resolving your medical fitness other than in court whilst doing nothing to expedite the decision. Applying to the magistrates’ court may well lead to DVLA submitting that the case should not be heard until they have completed the process of obtaining reports from their experts.
I think the courts are the appropriate forum to challenge the final decision in your case if you do not regain your LGV entitlement, but using them to challenge an interim decision may well slow the process further.
Nevertheless, I think this could be the time to get a solicitor experienced in these matters. They may be able to make such a strong case to DVLA for the restoration of your LGV entitlement that you do not need to go to court. A solicitor should certainly be able to lean on DVLA to resolve your case. Solicitor’s letters tend to focus the mind, especially when they carry an implied threat that the whole sorry mess will go before the courts if it is not resolved.
Getting a solicitor’s letter sent may well not cost that much - typically you would need a fixed-fee interview and to pay for the letter. My personal solicitor charges around £85 + VAT in the context of a contractual dispute, which may give you some guide as to the costs of working with a specialist road traffic solicitor.
I think that an application to the magistrates’ court is probably only appropriate if DVLA go through the process of sending you to their doctor again and either continue to refuse to make a decision or decide you do not meet the standard for LGVÂ entitlement. If you are going to court, you really do need a solicitor with some experience in these matters, otherwise you will likely be fighting a very unequal battle.
There’s really three jobs to be done if you are going to court:
If you have not been legally advised and are not legally represented, you will be up against civil servants who are used to preparing these cases for court, and in court will either be facing a civil servant with litigation training or a solicitor. Losing at the magistrates’ court would likely make it very hard to get your LGV entitlement back (the only way may be via judicial review, involving an expensive application to the High Court and significant legal bills - you’re talking about thousands of pounds), so you want to put the best possible case forward.
At the moment, the situation you are in is really one of maladministration. It may be worth your while writing to your MP, asking them to contact DVLA to see if anything can be done and asking for the case to be referred to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman. Stress to your MP that you are suffering financial loss because of DVLA’s maladministration.
I know from personal experience with DVLA Drivers Medical Branch that they can be a bunch of muppets, blindly and unthinkingly applying what they believe to be procedure whilst missing the bigger picture.
At the moment, I only have entitlement stemming from a pre-1997 car test, though my neurologist has said this past week that he would be happy to write a letter confirming that I meet the Group 2 (vocational) driving standard. In 2010, I had to renew my licence photo, which meant it was time to update my ancient medical declaration in the light of more expert medical opinion.
I wrote to DVLA, giving details of my medical condition and my doctors, confirming that my neurologist would confirm my ongoing fitness to drive. My letter answered every question from the CN1 neurology questionnaire (I can’t write and the electronic version of the form is totally unsuitable for conversion to the sort of form you can fill in on screen) and I enclosed an original signed DVLA consent form.
The clowns at DVLA wrote back after two months, asking me to fill in the general questionnaire they had enclosed, which was much less suited to enquiring into my condition. When I rang Medical Branch to complain, I was told that a doctor had gone through my letter (patent rubbish - it clearly had not been read properly, not least as it stated it answered all the CN1 neurology questions) and that they needed me to fill in the questionnaire. I replied that I’d already answered the questions on the neurology questionnaire in my letter, which they had ignored, and stated that if they’d e-mail me any follow-up questions, I’d be happy to answer them. The operator insisted they needed the general questionnaire, so I reminded them I couldn’t write. I was told to take the form to my GP, but I replied that GPs are busy and certainly aren’t a form-filling service - and, in any case, they had all the information they needed. In reply, I was told that I either filled in the questionnaire or they would revoke my licence!
By this stage, I had the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 open in front of me (now repealed and replaced by the Equality Act 2010), so I pointed out the duty of organisations to make reasonable adjustments for disabled people. I stated that I was not refusing to answer DVLA’s questions, but I needed questions to be put in a format I could deal with, also I believed I had answered all the necessary questions in my letter.
At this point I gave up, told the operator he’d better put his position in writing and hung up. Twenty minutes later, I called back and complained to the supervisor, who agreed that they probably had everything they needed in my original letter, but she would check. She called me back later to say that the medical screeners had confirmed they had everything they needed, so my case would be re-examined based on my original letter.
I’m sure you can see the pattern - DVLA make a mistake, insist they are the law and you dance to their tune, and take advantage of the power imbalance even when an obvious mistake is pointed out. I can see the comparisons to your case!
In the end, they put my case right to the back of the queue, it took them another two months to say they were contacting my GP for confirmation of the facts I had declared and another month after that to write to my GP! By this time, they were blaming my GP for the delay in dealing with the case, even when they had only just got round to writing to him. Clearly this was shifting the blame for their own dismal failure to meet their standards for the time taken to deal with my case.
After nine months they decided not to restrict my licence and I finally got a new licence document.
Thanks djw, looks like you’ve been through the monumental struggle. I was just trying to read around the declaration on the letter that I ‘'could challenge the decision in a Magistrates Court, but you must inform the DVLA before doing so’’ 
Why would they state this?, has anyone tried it?, does the threat of legal action focus their minds and galvanise them into action?, or does it just result in the steel shutters crashing down and an even longer wait for them to do something.
Either way my ■■■■ is starting to boil now 
BTW Mods, I meant to post it in the drivers forum, doh 
Big Joe:
Thanks djw, looks like you’ve been through the monumental struggle. I was just trying to read around the declaration on the letter that I ‘'could challenge the decision in a Magistrates Court, but you must inform the DVLA before doing so’’
I’ve likely got another struggle if I apply for provisional C and DÂ entitlement! Part of me regrets not applying 18 months ago, but my greatest concern then was hanging on to category B. If DVLA revoked my C1 entitlement on medical grounds, there would have be no point applying for provisional C. It was a ‘stick or twist’ scenario - category B is so important to me that I decided to play it safe rather than try a risky application for provisional C and possibly finish up with restrictions or revocation of my category B entitlement.
I’m not familiar with the particular legal provisions surrounding the requirement to inform DVLA before applying to the magistrates’ courts, but I suspect it is to allow DVLA to ensure they have completed their consideration of the case before it is before the court. You can see why I feel it is more likely that going to court at this stage will slow things down.
Hopefully you can find an appropriate solicitor to deal with this - if it just takes a solicitor’s letter, that will cost you relatively little and will save a lot of stress. Organisations tend to be a little bit more careful when they know a solicitor is scrutinising their reply and there is an elevated possibility of the matter going to court. My suspicion is that a solicitor’s letter will help speed things up, as it acts as an implicit reminder that court is a possibility, but actual legal action will slow things down. However, a solicitor experienced in dealing with DVLA on driver’s medical fitness matters will be able to offer first-hand advice.
As someone has posted about the DVLA and their attitude of what they say goes, I thought I’d add some of my experience. As you’ll find in my own thread on here, I had a heart attack last June, 3 days after applying for my LGV Provisional. Now, nearly a year later, I’m still waiting for a decision on my application. Apparently they (DVLA) can not write en bloc to all Dr’s and Consultants, instead contacting them 1 at a time, waiting for a reply, considering that reply then writing to the next. Back in Feb, they wrote to my consultant, (for a pre existing heart condition, that had caused my application to be refused in the past, now given the assurance that the Consultant would back my application with evidence I’m fit to drive LGV), asking for a medical questionaire to be filled in and returned to them. Unfortunately they had written to a Dr Flynn and not Dr Fynn, maybe a simple mistake but 1 they refused to correct, on the basis that “it’ll reach him sir”. So after waiting, and waiting, the DVLA wrote to say they had not heard from him, and that this was the cause for the current delay.
So, I rang the Consultants secretary, and explained the situation, to be told that they didn’t have the questionnaire, and had never received it, but that she would contact the DVLA and request the form! Now, hats off to her, she didn’t have to do that, but in all fairness, she shouldn’t have to. The DVLA made a mistake, were told what the mistake was and still refused to amend it.
As society is moving more and more towards a box ticked or crossed Governance those that are charged with holding the pen are erring towards covering their arses and thus throttling UK incorporated.
Although i sympathise with you guys, DVLA has to be careful in renewing licences, its a bit like letting a killer out of jail early, only for them to kill again, and who gets the blame for that.
So in similar circumstances, someone at DVLA would take the can, so caution is the main word here.
In heart problems, it is a lot easier to gain a licence if the patient has not had surgery, but is merely treated with medicines, however, if a patient has had surgery, by-pass, or stents, the outcome is a lot different and will be treated less significently, and often leads to more tests via doctors/specialists related to the DVLA.
Upon saying all the above, there is no guarantee that a person/driver would not have a fatal heart attack after procedures, but i believe that heart patients are more safer than someone who hasnt had one, for they could have one without warning, as has happened in the past ( look at footballers for eg ) whereas patients who have been seen, tested, operated on, treadmilled, medecined, are under and in control, not 100%, but with certainty.
I wish you well.
There’s a reference somewhere (I believe in DVLA’s At a Glance guide for medical professionals, though it may be in the minutes of the various medical committees) to the numeric risk of recurrence of disabling symptoms that DVLA use as a yardstick when making decisions. The standard for Group 2 (vocational licences) is much higher than Group 1 (everything other that the C and D group categories).
In my case, my neurological problems do not cause disabling symptoms and the effect on my muscles and co-ordination does not interfere in any way with my control of a vehicle. If it did, DVLA would rightly restrict or revoke my licence. My challenge is to persuade them of my neurologist’s belief that I do indeed meet the Group 2 standard for vocational entitlement.
The main problem is that the system for assessing an individual driver’s fitness involves excessive delay and often elementary procedural errors. There would be nothing to complain about if DVLA collected information (including, where necessary, independent assessments) about a driver and made a reasoned decision on fitness in a fair, open and timely fashion, with a route of appeal easily available when they make an error.
djw:
There would be nothing to complain about if DVLA collected information (including, where necessary, independent assessments) about a driver and made a reasoned decision on fitness in a fair, open and timely fashion.
Amen to that.