Part 5: Road traffic Section 91: Production of licence to the court
This section adjusts the requirements for the production of a driving licence to a court.
	Subsection (2) amends section 7 of the RTOA 1988 to change the current duty on a person who is prosecuted for an offence involving obligatory or discretionary disqualification, and who is the holder of a licence, to produce their licence to the court.
	Currently, under section 7, the person must produce their licence to the court, but had the options of delivering it or posting it in advance of the hearing, or having it with them at the hearing.
	Also currently, under section 7, where the case was tried by a single justice on the papers without a hearing (under section 16A of the 1980 Act), and there is a conviction, that person must produce their licence to the court. The person was given the option of delivering their licence, posting it within the period allowed for indicating a wish to make representations, or, if the person had indicated a wish to make representations by having it with them at the hearing fixed to consider those representations.
	Subsection (2) removes the options of delivering or posting the licence to the court in advance in all these cases. As for taking it to the hearing, the Section imposes a duty on the accused to bring the licence to the hearing only where there is a hearing and where the accused attends. These adjustments are intended to minimise the extent to which a court needs to handle the physical licence administratively.
	Subsection (3) changes the powers of a court to order production of a licence.
	Currently, under section 27(1) of the RTOA 1988, where a person who is the holder of a licence is convicted of an offence involving obligatory or discretionary disqualification, and a court proposes to disqualify that person, or to make an order for the endorsement of their licence, the court must, unless they have already received it, require the licence to be produced to it. It is a summary offence not to comply subject to a maximum penalty of a fine at level 3 on the standard scale (currently £1,000).
	Subsection (3) amends section 27(1) to provide that:
the court, rather than being obliged to order licence production, will have a power to require production, which they may exercise at their discretion,
the power will apply both where the court proposes to disqualify (e.g. where it adjourns for sentencing) and where it disqualifies, and
the power will not apply where the court neither disqualifies, nor proposes to disqualify, a driver.
	These changes prevent a court having to handle the physical licence administratively where a driver faces endorsement but not disqualification. In disqualification cases it is envisaged that where the convicted driver is present in court with their licence the court will collect it there and then, but otherwise the court can pass the issue of collection of the licence over to the DVLA under their new enforcement power in Section 71. The changes also clarify that the court’s power to require licence production not only applies where a court proposes to disqualify but also where it orders disqualification (and the same sanction applies, that is, non-compliance is a summary offence subject to a maximum penalty of a fine at level 3 on the standard scale (currently £1,000)).