Ask the MAC – 19 Feb 2026

Clear vision…

Q. Does a driver need to notify the DVLA if they start wearing glasses for driving?

A. You must tell DVLA if you have any problem with your eyesight that affects both of your eyes (excluding short/long sightedness, or if you are colour blind), or the remaining eye if you only have one eye.

If a driver has to start wearing glasses for driving, this will have to be notified to DVLA as the driver will have code 01 (eyesight correction, for example glasses or contact lenses) added to their driving licence.

The minimum standard for cars is a visual acuity of at least decimal 0.5 (6/12) measured on the Snellen scale. For lorry and bus drivers, they must have a visual acuity at least 0.8 (6/7.5) measured on the Snellen scale in the driver’s best eye and at least 0.1 (6/60) on the Snellen scale in the other eye.

Going door to door…

Q. We have just won a new contract to clear houses belonging to local authorities. Would this be classed as door-to-door waste to qualify for the derogation from assimilated drivers’ hours rules, as the items are from domestic properties?

A. House clearances would not be classed as door-to-door collections for the purposes of the Department for Transport’s long-standing interpretation, as there are a number of conditions that must be met.

These are:

1. It should be carried out either by a public authority or by a private undertaking under contract to a public authority.

2. It should involve the primary collection of waste from household or commercial premises, including the collection of street cleansing waste (such as litter from public street bins), whereby the transport activity remains subsidiary to the collection. The waste collected from commercial premises must be similar to or of the same kind as that collected from households, it must be collected in the same way (eg door-to-door), it must not be subject to any special collection regime or special rules and must be collected using the same vehicles.

3. Such operations might involve longer aggregate journeys where there are several stops, particularly in rural areas, but such journeys should not normally exceed a radius of 50 kilometres from the place where a vehicle is normally based.

Ultimately, the interpretation would be a matter for the courts to decide.