More than 300 people are required to resit their practical driving tests following allegations Auckland Vehicle Testing New Zealand (VTNZ) officers accepted payments to pass applicants.<\/p>\n
Five driver testing officers (DTOs) at the Highbrook branch in Auckland have been sacked and their testing officer endorsements have been suspended pending the outcome of an investigation by NZTA.<\/p>\n
“NZTA has been informed by VTNZ that the DTOs had allegedly been accepting payments to pass people taking practical driver tests since 2023,” a NZ Transport Agency spokesperson confirmed to 1News in a statement.<\/p>\n
“Potentially fraudulent activity has been referred to police for investigation.”<\/p>\n
The site is currently not doing practical driver licence testing. <\/p>\n
NZTA is contacting 322 people who received a driver’s licence after sitting practical driving tests carried out by the officers involved during the period where fraud was suspected.<\/p>\n
The resits will come “at no cost to them, to confirm that they have the necessary skills to continue to hold a licence”.<\/p>\n
A police spokesperson confirmed to 1News the “matter has been referred to us, and remains under investigation”.<\/p>\n
‘We have zero tolerance for dishonesty’<\/p>\n
VTNZ country manager Greg O’Connor said they took the allegations, and public safety, seriously.<\/p>\n
\u201cI want to reassure everyone that we investigated with the utmost urgency,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cVTNZ places the highest importance on the integrity of licence testing and the safety of everyone who travels on our roads.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have zero tolerance for dishonesty, and will leave no stone unturned to uncover and eliminate any improper behaviour.\u201d<\/p>\n
Since the allegations came to light VTNZ had reviewed its systems and evaluated any extra security measures as a precaution.<\/p>\n
\u201cI promise that we will take the strongest action against any employee found breaking the law and our trust.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnyone sitting their driver licence test can still have complete faith in VTNZ.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was supporting police and NZTA’s investigation. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"More than 300 people are required to resit their practical driving tests following allegations Auckland Vehicle Testing New…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":63097,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[51,67,111,43,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-63096","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-zealand","8":"tag-auckland","9":"tag-crime-and-justice","10":"tag-new-zealand","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-newzealand","13":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63096","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63096"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63096\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63097"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63096"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63096"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63096"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}