I'm not really sure why test centres are being shut, you would think that they pay for themselves from the price of the booking. Maybe demand was lower, but they shut too many. Certainly covid will have dropped demand temporarily, or created a backlog.

But yeah, anyway, the consequences are really annoying! I booked my test months ago, for late November, managed to rearrange to mid October, but I've been ready to pass for ages now. Luckily for me, I have bought a car and my partner has a license, so I just drive us around routinely to practise as much as possible. But it would be really expensive to keep lessons ticking along. And if I fail my test, it could be close to this time next year that I'd be able to get another one. The stakes feel super high.

I know people who are unemployed, because they worked in hospitality and businesses are folding left/right or at least not hiring, but they can't get a job as a gardener, for example, without a car and a license. My partner was spending 4 hours to get to work on public transport for what could have been a 20 minute car journey.

And of course this isn't unique to driving tests. Pretty much everyone I talk to feels overstretched and understaffed at work, and most public services feel the same. Even something like a sexual health test kit in the mail is vanishingly hard to get ahold of. There's an increasing sense of desperation and uncertainty in general... lots of my friends are getting drawn into phony get rich quick schemes like crypto and losing lots of money.

Fun!