Written question asked by Chris Coghlan (Liberal Democrat) on Friday, 15 May 2026, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Tuesday, 19 May 2026. It was answered by Simon Lightwood (Labour) on Thursday, 21 May 2026 on behalf of the Department for Transport.

Motor Vehicles: Testing

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether she has made a recent assessment of the potential merits of requiring decibel readings of exhaust noises to be recorded during the MOT test for motorcycles and other road vehicles.

Answer

The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) regularly publishes data on MOT failures by vehicle type and failure category. Vehicle noise is included within ‘noise, emissions and leaks’.

The full MOT dataset is also available on GOV.UK in anonymised form, so users can carry out their own analysis.

For vehicles and motorcycles, the current visual and audible check as part of the MOT is sufficient to confirm an exhaust is properly silenced, as accurate exhaust noise measurements are not considered practical to measure accurately at all MOT test centres.

Secondary information

Type: Written question
Reference: 1842
Session: 2026-27
Grouped for answer: Yes
Subjects: Motor vehicles Noise Testing
Link: View this Written question on www.parliament.uk

Motor Vehicles: Testing

Secondary information

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