“Self-driving cars don't exist in the UK,” says university boffin

Is Uber ready to put driverless taxis onto Blighty’s roads? Commercially, sure. Technologically? Maybe. Legally? Definitely not. The government has pushed that expectation out to the latter half of 2027.

But even that date sounds ambitious to Professor Siddartha Khastgir, Head of Safe Autonomy at the University of Warwick. He explained to TopGear.com at the FT's Future of the Car summit: “There's a phase between having regulation... and understanding how you will use it. Self-driving cars don't exist in the UK. They will, but right now, no.”

The good scientist reckons autonomously driven (AD) cars won’t be on UK roads much before 2028, and wants us to mind our self-driving language. “Tesla [cars are] not autonomous. [The tech] is assistance.”

This is why the can has been routinely walloped down the road. Currently, there are two systems in Europe and the UK officially capable of AD: the BMW Personal Pilot, found in the 7 Series, and the Mercedes-Benz DrivePilot, featured in both the S-Class and EQS. Yup, these are the only two systems legitimately able to take over from the driver.

Before you grab your Kindle and recline the seat, here's the kicker - neither system is legal to use in the UK. Even in Germany, where these features are authorised for Joe Public, the car has to hand back control in the rain. Khastgir grins: “Imagine a product like that in the UK – it would keep handing control back!”

Uber might be impatient to get its self-driving taxis deployed here in the UK, but the whole thing gets murkier when you compare regulatory styles. In the US, manufacturers ‘self-certify’ – as in, 'trust me, we've done the homework'. If things go pear-shaped, it’s up to the courts to clean everything up. Europe and the UK on the other hand require third-party certification from independent government bodies.

And that 'Full Self-Driving' badge you’ve seen Stateside? The carmaker might have added ‘(Supervised)’ but that won’t be sufficient over here. Khastgir says: “It is a criminal offence in the UK for a carmaker to use ‘self-driving’ terminology to make it sound like the car can legally drive itself when it actually cannot.”

The Secretary of State for Transport has a list of cars authorised for ‘self-driving’, and in 2025... there's nothing on it.

Khastgir says we're getting used to assisted-driving features reacting in ways we don't expect – think autonomous emergency braking for an obstacle that isn't there. That's bad enough when you've got your hands on the wheel, but for autonomous driving? Nope, that just won't cut it.

So, back to the drawing board then? Not quite: the UK is pushing hard to become a world leader in autonomous tech. But with strict rules and soggy skies, the road to self-driving will be a hands-on journey. Ironic, huh?