My GV failed MOT today on what in my opinion should have been advisories.

I am quoting word for word

Brake failures: RBT Park brake efficiency 7%


1. offside rear parking brake recording little or no effort (3.7.B.6a)

2. nearside rear sill suspension component mounting prescribed area is excessively corroded (2.4.A.3)

3 Parking brake; efficiency below requirements (3.7.B.7)

I expected it to fail on smoke and after a good italian tune up it was ok on that front. I thrashed the engine to an inch of its life I feel the tester was very harsh. The hole in the sill was made this saturday after my son put the jack the wrong way and it went through the metal plate near the door

 

Condolences my Scottish friend. Hope you've got someone to listen to your woo's...
Anyway yes the handbrake is a problem but plenty on here on that issue. As too rusty hole you need a metal surgeon or mig welder. If your not any good at welding forget it as its very thin metal and needs tack stitching to join up then grinding to smooth off.
Not so much rust hole work getting done now due to better corrosion protection on cars. You may need to go to a repair facility, those who repair damaged cars.

 

I did try to adjust the handbrake manually as detailed here by Tfb, i pulled it up and down before the test and i was sure it was tight enough. The old boy really went over it with a fine tooth comb. Is it a case of simply replacing the cable or there might be more. I honestly thought at the very worst the handbrake would be an advisory He reckons the hole will need 2 hours work and will cost about 100 quid if they do it. Its not even rusted, the jack went through the soft edge when we were bleeding the brakes

I am really tempted to get it retested at local authority MOT test centre

 

- all taxi drivers and licensed operators avoid council like the plague, and for very good reasons
- while you can still get a free re-test do the handbrick yourself and shell out for a bit of welding, or do it yourself

Best of luck.