L-drivers face test strike chaos

Thousands of driving tests may be cancelled today because of a pay strike by examiners.

Learner drivers were advised to turn up for their tests because it was not known how many of the 1,400 examiners would join in the action.

Attempts to contact test centres in advance were also being thwarted as office staff who would normally answer the phone are backing the dispute.

Union leaders said up to 5,000 tests could be cancelled because of the 48-hour stoppage, which continues tomorrow, by administration workers in the Driving Standards Agency (DSA). The Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) which represents civil service workers, timed the action to coincide with the second half of a 48-hour walkout by thousands of staff in the Department for Works and Pensions (DWP) in a separate row over pay.

That dispute has closed many Jobcentres and benefit offices - with East London particularly hard hit. It is the worst industrial unrest in the civil service for more than a decade and comes after staff overwhelmingly rejected a 2.6per cent pay rise.

Strikers' anger increased today following a leak of a report from the head of an efficiency review for the Government suggesting that up to 80,000 civil service jobs could be axed. Union leaders immediately said they would fight any such moves.

The PCS warned that pay negotiations in several other Government departments, including the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, the Department of Transport and the Cabinet Office had not been resolved and ballots for industrial action could not be ruled out.