Diary Of An ADI - A Driving Instructor's Blog

Beeston Test Centre Plausible Pettiness

04/06/2015

You know, when I lost my job and became self-employed I thought I was done with the rat race and its crapola for good. Unfortunately, it appears to have festered and grown, and there’s so much of it about these days it’s like stepping in dog shit every five minutes. Female foot on male symbols

I don’t use the Beeston Test Centre as often as Clifton or Colwick. It’s not that I deliberately avoid it – if pupils want their tests there, then that’s where we go – but since I do a lot of my lessons on the south side of Nottingham both to avoid traffic and to get them out on different types of roads, pupils get comfortable with that area and often declare that they’d like to do their tests over that way. Personally, I find Beeston less comfortable – the chairs in the waiting room are hard, upright, and fixed against the wall, and on weekends you can’t use it at all because the main block of the Business Centre is locked up.

On normal days I like to sit quietly in the reception area with a coffee. But I can’t do that any more. This is the latest sign that has been sellotaped to just about every window and wall.

FOR THE ATTENTION OF VISITING DRIVING INSTRUCTORS

PLEASE NOTE THE MAIN BUSINESS CENTRE RECEPTION IS NOT THE DVSA WAITING ROOM, THEY PROVIDE THEIR OWN WAITING ROOM FOR THE SOLE USE OF ALL CANDIDATES AND THEIR INSTRUCTORS. THIS ROOM IS LOCATED THROUGH THE DOUBLE DOORS AT THE REAR OF RECEPTION IN UNIT A1:A2.

THE BUSINESS CENTRE IS A MULTI OCCUPIED BUILDING AND AS SUCH THIS RECEPTION AREA ACTS AS THE MAIN RECEPTION FOR ALL RESIDENT COMPANIES ALONG WITH PROSPECTIVE NEW TENANTS WHO MAYBE VIEWING THE PREMISES FOR THE FIRST TIME.

IT IS ALSO THE MAIN THOROUGHFARE AND FIRE EXIT DOORS IN THE CASE OF AN EMERGENCY AND IN LIGHT OF THIS, I AM SURE YOU WILL APPRECIATE WE MUST ENSURE THERE ARE NO OBSTRUCTIONS WHEN ENTERING OR EXITING THROUGH SAID DOORS, WHILST ALSO MAINTAINING A PROFESSIONAL FIRST IMPRESSION AT ALL TIMES.

THEREFORE, WHILST WAITING FOR YOUR PUPILS TO RETURN FROM THEIR DRIVING TESTS, PLEASE WAIT IN THE DVSA WAITING ROOM FOR THE DURATION OF THE TEST, NOT THE CENTRE’S MAIN RECEPTION. IF YOU WISH TO BE PRESENT JUST PRIOR TO THEIR RETURN, IN VIEW OF THE ABOVE CAN I RESPECTIVELY ASK THAT YOU EXIT THE BUILDING IMMEDIATELY AND REFRAIN FROM STANDING IN OR AROUND THE MAIN THOROUGHFARE AT ALL TIMES.

THANKING YOU FOR YOUR CO-OPERATION IN THIS MATTER.

CENTRE MANAGER

It’s slightly ironic they should mention “professionalism” and “[first appearances]” – I’ve always considered that having stupid Do This/Don’t Do That signs stuck up all over the place is about as unprofessional as you can get. And don’t even get me started on how pathetically childish it is.

From what I can gather, and having spoken with others, the woman who runs the reception shares a few chromosomes with the secretaries we used to have when I was in the rat race who – far from recognising their position on the lower rungs of the ladder in the big scheme of things – believe that they’re somewhere at the top. The problem is that in the modern world, ♀ + ♂ = ♀♀♀, so for all practical purposes they are near the top. Secretaries always report to someone higher up than you, and if that person is a male then he has no choice but to acquiesce over any complaint they might make, since he runs the risk of finding himself the subject of a Special Report in The Sun if he doesn’t. His only recourse is to agree with her totally and sanction the erection of a bunch of stupid signs.

Just for the record, whenever I’ve sat or stood quietly in that reception area, at least half of the time it has had a constant stream of noisy blokes in dirty overalls standing around, delivery men dropping stuff off, and on more than one occasion someone talking to that receptionist for the whole 40 minutes. And I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone who works in the place who was photogenic enough to be seen by the public in that reception area.

Among the other signs that have appeared, which have stopped just short of singling out ADIs, we have:

the one about closing the front door
the one about how the ladies toilet is for ladies only, and how there is a separate one for men
the one about how the office door in the corridor between the DVSA waiting room and the male toilet is not the male toilet

All of these are in addition to signs that are specific to other tenants concerning waste recycling, the state the ladies toilets are being left in, and so on. There’s hardly any wall space left.

Thinking back, it all started when the DVSA first located to the Beeston Business Park. The first time I went there I hadn’t got a clue where to go after I entered the building. However, as my first test at Beeston was a few weeks after it opened, there was already another bloody printed sign on the reception desk with a terse message about where to go. You could smell the “attitude” even then – the receptionist obviously got tired of directing people very quickly.

One thing is clear: DVSA are not welcome as tenants of the Business Park. After all, none of the other tenants are confined to their offices, and ordered to exit the building immediately they leave them. The “centre manager” needs to get it into his skull that although there might be one or two ADIs who really are so stupid that they can’t identify a ladies toilet or close a door, not all of them are like that.

Driving Test Turns 80

01/06/2015

DOAADI

Driving Tests, DVSA, News

An email alert from DVSA reports that the driving test is 80 years old. Compulsory testing began 1 June 1935.

As you can imagine, the media has picked up the story, and this report by the BBC is interesting. I mean, there’s only so many words you can write around the premise of the test being 80 years old, so they’ve somehow managed to bring up the slightly negative issue of pass rates.

It’s not as if this is new – it was in the news in 2011, and I wrote about it then (Mallaig was still the “easiest” place to pass your test even then). The same topic has been in the news several times since, but the Beeb has obviously decided to dig it up once again.

The story is pretty mundane, but the comments made by driving instructors make it much more interesting. In the article, Belvedere in Bexley is identified as having a pass rate 15% below the average. A local instructor offers his wisdom on why this might be… no wait: on why it most definitely is:

…Mark Hewitt, who stopped taking pupils to the Belvedere test centre a year ago because of its reputation, said it was not the busy roads that make it tough.

“I don’t think it’s the test centre, it’s the examiners,” he said.

“A few of them are all right, the rest just don’t chat. They are so dead quiet. Pupils need to see that the examiners are human as well.”

Oh dear. Not again. How do these people ever become instructors? And why?

Examiners are supposed to be quiet, and the majority conduct themselves accordingly. The chattier ones soon shut up when they have their supervisor in the back assessing them, and they also know when to shut up during the test. Every test centre has a mix of quiet and not-so-quiet examiners. However, it amuses me that no matter how an examiner conducts his or her tests, there’s always someone ready to blame them for their (or their pupil’s) failure.

At one of our centres there is an examiner who you could legitimately describe as “a lovely woman”, in the sense that she is like everyone’s mum or auntie. She’s always friendly, always tries to put the candidate at ease, and always ready to have a chat about holidays or work with the pupil. But believe me when I tell you that she is the devil incarnate as far as some candidates are concerned… if she fails them. Those dreaded words “I’m sorry, but you haven’t passed” are a potent magic spell that Gandalf or Harry Potter would die for to possess. In roughly the 10 seconds it takes to say them, then have them sink in, the nicest examiner becomes an ogre. Examiners simply cannot win.

The instructor quoted in the BBC story reckons Belvedere has a lower than average pass rate because the examiners “don’t chat”. That’s just complete crap. Far more relevant is the fact that the non-UK born population in Bexley has risen by 73% in the last decade, and in some of the surrounding areas it has gone up by even more. If you look at pass rates in Barking you see a similar trend – higher immigrant population, lower pass rate compared to the national average. That – and the busy roads and frantic junctions – are bound to affect test outcomes.

It doesn’t matter that a particular test centre has a higher or lower rate, nor does the candidates’ nationality or ethnicity. The two pieces of data are merely facts which show a reasonable degree of correlation. What’s more important is that pass rate is not a probability – something I’ve written about before. A pupil who can drive well has as much chance of passing at a test centre with a 20% pass rate as they do at one with 70%, because it is bad drivers who pull the figures down.

This Is An Absolute First!

29/05/2015

DOAADI

ADI, Driving Tests, DVSA

I picked one of my pupils up for his lesson last week, and he informed me he had failed his theory test. When I questioned him, it became clear he’d failed on the hazard perception part. He’d scored 0 for it – no points whatsoever for any of the 14 clips.

I know he’d been practising, because getting his licence is important to him. So what happened for him to get no points at all?

He fell asleep!

Yup. As the HPT began, he just sat there and fell asleep. I could scarcely believe it

What caused it was a combination of things. To begin with, he is a carer, and that means he works stupid hours for little more than the minimum wage. Secondly, he has a baby daughter, and he has to look after her when his wife’s at work and he’s not. I figure that some nights he must not get any sleep at all.

But as if those two things on their own were not enough, I have discovered that he now has a second job in a hospital. It hasn’t started yet, but it is the one he’s been looking for as it carries higher pay and greater security. When I asked him why he hasn’t dumped the first job yet, his answer was that he is currently caring for someone and he wants to finish that before he hands in his notice. What a great guy.

He nearly didn’t go to the interview, either. When they called him he realised he had no one to look after the baby and said he wouldn’t be able to make it – to which they replied “bring the baby along”. So he did.

In the latter years of my time in the rat race, I was literally praying nightly for something to happen which meant I didn’t have to put up with unnecessary crap any more (my prayers were answered, of course, and I became a driving instructor). If I’d have had to put up with any more nonsense from those prats I worked for I think it would have killed me. But this pupil has it even worse.

A14 Rubberneckers To Get Points And Fine

29/05/2015

DOAADI

Bad Drivers, News

There was a major crash on the A14 in Cambridgeshire yesterday involving four lorries. Fortunately, no one was seriously injured – though one driver had to be cut free from his cab.

The best part of the story by far is that a police officer on the scene saw drivers using their mobiles to photograph and film the carnage as they drove by. Several were observed to swerve as they lost control. So he noted their registration numbers, and twenty of them will now receive 3 points and a £100 fine through the post. If any of the cases go to court – if the drivers contested the fines, for example – then they could face up to 9 points and a £5,000 fine.

Even the 3 points could take some of them over the limit and into a ban if they already have points on their licences.

Sometimes the Law almost gets it right. Mind you, even if the points take some of them over the limit for a ban, I bet some will avoid losing their licences because “their jobs depend on it”.

Addil Haroon Jailed For 6 Years

29/05/2015

DOAADI

Bad Drivers, News

A contender for the 2015 Darwin Awards, Addil Haroon, 18, had no licence, no insurance, and no car (the Audi he was in was hired in someone else’s name). He had photographed the speedo while he was driving at 140mph the day before he sped through a red traffic light at high speed and ploughed into another Audi. This picture shows what he achieved.

He boasted on social media about his speed:

Leeds to Rochdale in 11 minutes. Catch me.

Beat this Leeds to Rochdale in 11 minutes. I beat the f****** s*** out of that last night. No mercy.

He was seen doing 80mph in a 20mph zone just before the accident, in which he sliced another Audi in two killing Joseph Brown-Lartey, 24, instantly.

Scumbag, Haroon, was jailed for six years and also banned from driving for six years (though knowing British Law, those two probably run concurrently, so when he gets out in four years he’ll only have to wait for two more before he is legally allowed back on the road). Everything that was said in court points to him being a stereotypical prick.

Unfortunately, the wrong man was removed from the gene pool.

Judging from the number of hits this has received in less than 24 hours – and where they are from – it seems Haroon has a lot of friends out there.

Tyne Police Foil Bovine Terror Plot

20/05/2015

DOAADI

Funny, News

Sometimes you couldn’t make it up. Three cows “escaped” from a country park in North Tyneside. Two were recaptured, but one – Bessie – was shot “in the interests of public safety” after apparently attempting to rob several local banks and then going on the run.

John Millard, a photographer, witnessed the scene:

…there was a “massive police presence” with more than 15 police vehicles, a helicopter hovering overhead, and three or four officers in sniper gear.

Northumbria police were anxious to talk it up into the serious threat that it wasn’t, though:

…[the cow] was destroyed after becoming “increasingly distressed” and “causing dangerous and severe obstructions” on a major road.

I wonder why the cow was becoming “distressed”, Mr Police Spokesman? I mean, it couldn’t have had anything to do with dozens of people chasing it (i.e. at least two officers in each of the 15+ vehicles) and no doubt shouting and pretending to be Arnold Schwarzenegger, and a helicopter, could it?

The local residents are keeping the surrealness alive by organising a candle-lit vigil for the dead cow.

Pick an A Level… Any A Level

19/05/2015

DOAADI

ADI

I just got a good giggle from my inbox. The Tri-coaching partnership has sent out an email which is titled “supply and demand lead to profit”.

No, really?

If you feel that you need to go on the course to find out how this complex concept works it’ll cost you at least £275 – or £400 if you want the BTEC certificate at the end. As I have said in the About Me page, my experience of NVQs and BTECs is that they aren’t worth the paper they’re written on. The one being touted here is Level 3, and is therefore apparently “worth” three A levels.

Three A levels in just two days, for £125? Hang on a minute while I try not to choke laughing.

If my memory serves me correctly, an A level was something that took two years of full-time study and hard work. It culminated in a difficult exam (possibly several, depending on the subject). Back when I did them – when they were still hard – you usually only took two, unless one of them was in a non-science subject. Failure was a distinct possibility. What an A level wasn’t was something you acquired just by turning up and paying a wad of cash for over two days (if you tried to get one that way, chances are you’d get kicked out of sixth form or find yourself on criminal charges). And you couldn’t get more than one A level from a single course – each one was a separate entity, and two A levels was twice as much work as one.

But I can’t get that “supply and demand lead to profit” thing out of my head. Anyone who needs to attend a course to discover that shouldn’t be allowed out on their own!

More Legal Gobbledegook

19/05/2015

DOAADI

Movies & TV, News

Following on from that last story, here’s an example of more legal gobbledegook – this time, quite possibly with a virtual death sentence for someone.

To begin with, just consider what those retards did at Charlie Hebdo back in January 2015, and why. Then consider what the cretins in Isis are doing to people almost daily. With such a suitable backdrop, now consider what that first story is all about.

An American film called “Innocence of Muslims” was banned from YouTube on the orders of a federal court. Actress, Cindy Lee Garcia, had received death threats as a result of her involvement – which she was tricked into, as she had not acted specifically for that film or that role. The editing made it look as if she was accusing the Prophet Muhammad of being a child molester. You can imagine the incendiary nature of such a suggestion when you consider the brittle mental state of those people who start issuing death threats over things like this.

Enter: Google. As most people will be aware, Google is a company which seems to believe that pretty much anything and everything should be allowed under the auspices of free speech on the internet solely in order for Google to reap obscene profits from it all. Oh, it will sometimes ban things – especially if it looks like not doing so could impact earnings – but otherwise it is essentially a clone of the British Press as far as demands for the freedom to publish anything about anyone go. Except that it is about a million times bigger.

This behemoth has been seeking to overturn the original judgement on the basis that it was “a misapplication of copyright law”. It has now got its way, and is free to put the film back on YouTube (which it owns). No decision has yet been taken over whether or when that will happen but Google is no doubt wetting its trousers over the victory now that such a decision lies with it and not with someone above it (i.e. the Law).

If they do (and even because they originally did) reinstate it, it will obviously be open season on Ms Garcia as far as some idiots out there are concerned. I hope Google is proud.

The film should have remained banned. It is simply a crap attempt at shit stirring.

Gay Cake Row – Recipe All Wrong?

19/05/2015

DOAADI

News

I’ve just seen this on the BBC website. I only vaguely remember hearing about the row some time ago.

Ashers is a bakery in Northern Ireland. It is run by devout Christians, and when they were approached by a militantly gay person to make a cake with a gay slogan on it, they refused. The customer, Gareth Lee – who is described as “a gay rights activist”, hence my use of the word “militant” – took them to court.

Well, it seems that the judge has rule against Ashers. Ashers had said before the judgement:

We happily serve everyone but we cannot promote a cause that goes against what the Bible says about marriage.

We have tried to be guided in our actions by our Christian beliefs.

The judge ruled:

[Ashers are] conducting a business for profit, [they are not a religious group,]
They were found to have discriminated against Mr Lee on the grounds of sexual orientation.

Martin McGuinness (Deputy First Minister) tweeted:

Asher’s bakery judgement a good result for equality, Gay people have for far too long been discriminated against. We and the law on their side.

David McIlveen (DUP) tweeted:

Utterly sickened that a Christian owned business has been hauled over the coals for refusing to promote something that is not legal in NI.

Personally, I can see an appeal coming on (if NI allows that sort of thing). Ashers would happily have provided Lee with a cake. They just refused to put a gay slogan on it. It makes you wonder what would have happened if they’d have refused to make one with a pro-jihadist slogan. By the precedent set in this judgement, they would therefore be guilty of racial discrimination.

And what about fast food outlets run by Muslims who only use Halal meat? Since – also by precedent – they are not religious groups either, but profit-making enterprises, shouldn’t they be required by Law to also provide non-Halal meat? Oh, and pork products? Can you imagine the flood of racial discrimination claims that would arise if they were forced to do these things? And who do you think would win?

Note that I am simply commenting on the skewed logic of the judgment. Don’t try and read into my views on any of those involved as far as their beliefs or lifestyle preferences go (though I’m certain that’s exactly what some jackass is bound to do). I’m as much against having other people’s religious beliefs rammed down my throat as I am of having their sexual orientation similarly thrust at me.

Fog Catchers Irrigate Deserts in Chile

17/05/2015

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Nature, World

Chile’s Atacama Desert is widely considered to be the driest place on earth. Some weather stations in the area have never recorded any rainfall at all, and others go for four years or more without recording any. It is believed that the region has been like this for at least 3 million years.

This story has been in the media before, but I was interested to see this BBC article which explains how they are using fine nets as fog traps to catch water from the regular fogs which roll in from the South Pacific. When I looked into it a little more, I found these two videos on YouTube.

Apparently, they can average 15,000 litres of water a day (I assume that is for each bank of nets). In the first video, local farmers are using the water to irrigate Aloe Vera crops. The second video shows them using the method to provide water to the city of Tacna, Peru, which has grown significantly in recent years. It’s weird seeing vegetables growing in desert sand.

It’s a great story.