Scotland is the most expensive place in UK to learn to drive

SCOTLAND is the most expensive part of the UK in which to learn to drive, a new survey has shown.

The average UK price for an hour's lesson with a driving school is 22.30, but in Scotland the average cost per lesson is 24.03.

With an average of 45 hours needed to pass the driving test, the total cost of taking lessons for Scots comes in at 1,081.

Howard Redwood, head of road safety at the Driving Instructors Association, said that the high cost of lessons north of the Border was down to the demands of demographics and also the geographic spread of population.

"The situation is that Scotland has about 8 per cent of the UK population, and that's spread mainly through the Central Belt, with some in the Highlands," he said.

"So if you've got lots of driving instructors, they still have to make money and that affects the costs, especially in Scotland where instructors also have to drive further because of the geographical spread of population.

"You have to take into account that an instructor has to earn 10.20 an hour just to cover the costs of running the car. That's excluding tax and paying themselves a salary."

Mr Redwood said that, in real terms, the cost of learning to drive was extremely low given its potential benefits.

"If you have a 17-year-old wanting to learn to drive, then they potentially have their licence for at least 53 years.

"If you look at the potential cost of learning to drive in relation to this period of time, it works out at just about 40p a week, which is less than the price of a packet of crisps.

"Half of the problem is that people do not value their driver's licence. They treat it as if it fell out of a box of cereal.

"But in learning to drive they are developing lifelong skills; ones that can help develop their careers. Statistically, it's estimated that having a clean driver's licence can add 12 per cent to an employee's salary."

The poll, commissioned by Yell.com, was based on online interviews with 604 people.

Neil Greig, spokesman for the Institute of Advanced Motorists, agreed with Mr Redwood. He said that it was money well spent on a "skill for life".

He said, however, that the IAM's policy was to recommend a combination of professional instruction and parental lessons as the best way of learning to drive.

"It really shouldn't be just one or another," he said."The safest drivers are those who get to learn the full driving syllabus from the professional instructor, but whose family can take them out driving at different times, on different roads and in different cars."

According to the poll, Welsh learner drivers get the best deal, with the average hourly rate of manual or automatic lessons in Wales being 19.99 and the overall cost of becoming road-ready therefore being 899.55.

James Wallace, a spokesman for Yell.com, said: "I'm incredibly surprised that the cost of lessons can vary so greatly."