Do I need any kind of licence before i'm allowed get driving lessons?


You don't necessarily have 2 years experience by the time your first provisional licence has expired. When I got my first licence I rarely sat behind the wheel and had practically no experience by the time it expired. I was then, theoretically entitled to drive alone for 2 years.
 
...Up to the test my insurance company knew I was driving alone and I was fully covered...

That's what everyone seems to think. Probably cause no one's heard of a case where the insurance company refused to pay out when a driver on a provisional, driving on their own, caused an accident. However if the damage were high enough, then the insurance company may refuse.

I'm thinking something along the lines of crashing into an oil tanker on the M50 toll bridge, causing said tanker to crash over the bridge and go up in flames causing structural damage to the bridge and serious polution to surrounding area and Liffey. I did hear of a similar accident in Germany where the offending driver was found to have been on drugs (cannibis or cocaine, can't remember) and the insurance company was refusing to pay out.
 
I'm thinking something along the lines of crashing into an oil tanker on the M50 toll bridge

This kind of gets back to my original question about whether you are insured to drive even though your provisional license says you cant drive alone.

This is made doubly worse on the M50 because as far as I'm aware , provisional drivers are banned from dual carriageways also according to the terms of their licence.
 
This is made doubly worse on the M50 because as far as I'm aware , provisional drivers are banned from dual carriageways also according to the terms of their licence.

I think it's motorways which provisional licence holders are banned from using, not dual carriageways.
 
Kind of off topic:

If i learn in an a/t transmission car will I only be licenced for automatic or both manual & auto?
 
Kind of off topic:

If i learn in an a/t transmission car will I only be licenced for automatic or both manual & auto?


If you take your test in an a/t car and are successful, your full licence will be limited or restricted to a/t vehicles as far as I'm aware
 


Knew an ex-work colleague on a provisional a couple of years back who rear-ended someone on the M50 - his insurance company wouldn't pay out on the basis that his driving on a motorway was a voluntary violation of the traffic laws by him, and basically invalidated his policy
 
Yes, manual transmission licence covers both manual and a/t , but not the other way around