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According to my diary, on March 12th 1935 Britain introduced a 30 mph speed limit in built-up areas, and on 13th March 1935 a voluntary driving test was introduced.
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...voluntary driving test...
A relation of mine, who died in the late 80s, never took a driving test.
He was born around 1900 and I recall him telling me he just sent away for a licence - it was no more than a form filling exercise.
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The licence rules were relaxed again during the war. Anyone could just go into a Post Office and buy one. My mother and her sister bought licences just because they thought they might come in handy. Neither could drive at the time.
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My recently-departed aunt obtained her licence from a Post Office in the '30s and learned to drive on a car which had the accelerator pedal in the middle.
I swear that in later years she never fully adapted...
659.
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My Grandad (then aged 19 or 20) took the voluntary test soon after it was introduced - his boss sent him (he worked at a garage) to "Find out what it was about" for the customers. IIRC he only passed because he saw the (then also new) traffic light sequence reflected in his glasses when asked a question about them.
In a similar vein, today is the 17th anniversay of me passing my test, so soon I will have been able to drive longer than I haven't. How time flies!
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My mother (b.1904) must have been fairly unusual in owning a car in her early twenties (some kind of Jowett), and she certainly never took a test. Her last car was an 1100 auto, which lasted till about 1980.
As an aside, when our last house (built in 1930) was reroofed about 25 years ago, we found an original newspaper in the rafters. Someone was advertising a Jowett Javelin for £150.
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I seem to recall that the regs on driving tests were altered or suspended temporarily again in 1956, at the time of the Suez crisis. I used to work with a guy who drove for a living but had never taken a test because his age coincided with Suez.
My father drove trucks for a living for the greater part of his life but the only test he ever took was in the Army in 1941. I've still got the pass sheet somewhere.
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I seem to recall that the regs on driving tests were altered or suspended temporarily again in 1956 at the time of the Suez crisis. I used to work with a guy who drove for a living but had never taken a test because his age coincided with Suez.
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Not sure about the test, but I know the regs for requiring a qualified driver beside you was relaxed.
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a voluntary driving test was introduced.
Judging by the scroats you see having their collar felt on Police Camera Action! and the like, many people still consider the driving test to be voluntary ...
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Prior to 1970 a test pass in an automatic entitled you to drive a manual.
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