After getting royal approval, the Automated Vehicles (AV) Act became law. This is the last step that any law has to go through before it becomes law. The U.K. says that its rules for self-driving cars are “world-leading.”
Fully self-driving cars could be on U.K. roads in two years, according to the government.
In a statement, Transport Secretary Mark Harper said, “This doesn’t take away people’s freedom to choose to drive themselves. Instead, our landmark legislation means that self-driving cars can be on British roads as early as 2026, which is great for both safety and our economy.”
The news comes just a few weeks after Wayve, a company based in the U.K., raised more than $1 billion from well-known companies like SoftBank, Nvidia, and Microsoft to keep working on making a self-learning software system for self-driving cars. 
Like many other countries, the U.K. has let driverless cars use public roads for a long time, but there are strict rules for companies that want to try out new technologies. But as the business for self-driving cars has grown and gotten ready for prime time, it became clear that we needed a new set of laws.
The Law Commissions of England, Wales, and Scotland released a report in 2022, officially proposing the AV Act after several years of preliminary work. The report said that the arrival of self-driving cars requires a “new vocabulary, new legal actors, and new regulatory schemes.” It read:
The introduction of automated vehicles will have profound legal consequences … it requires new regulatory schemes and new actors (with new responsibilities and liabilities). We therefore recommend primary legislation — a new Automated Vehicles Act — to regulate automated vehicle on roads or other public places in Great Britain.Automated
Vehicles: Joint report of the the Law Commission of England and Wales and the Scottish Law Commission
Who is responsible if a self-driving car does something wrong?
The U.K. has been supporting a number of autonomous vehicle (AV) projects and safety study programs in order to be at the forefront of the AV change. The government has talked up the possible safety benefits of self-driving cars by getting rid of human mistakes on the roads. However, stories from the United States, where self-driving cars are more common, show that accidents will still happen. In fact, California has become a hub for ideas on how to regulate AVs.
This is why one of the most important parts of the U.K.’s new rule is liability: who is responsible if there is an accident? In 2022, the UK made this point clearer when it released a plan that said its new laws would hold companies responsible for any accidents. This means that a human driver would not be responsible for accidents that happen while the car is driving.
For every accepted self-driving car, there will be an “authorised self-driving entity” that goes with it. This is usually the car’s maker, but it could also be the software creator or the insurance company. When the car enters self-driving mode, this entity will take control.
A “completely independent incident investigation function” will support the method the government sets up for car approvals. Under the new rules, companies must continuously ensure the safety of their vehicles.
