IELTS General Training Reading Practice Test 7

SECTION 1 — Questions 1–14

Read the text below and answer Questions 1–7.

Carlton Community Theatre: Booking Information

How to book
You can book tickets online at any time. Phone bookings are taken from Tuesday to Saturday between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. You can also buy tickets in person at the box office, which opens one hour before every performance. A booking fee of £1.50 per ticket is charged for online and phone bookings, but not for tickets bought in person.

Prices and discounts
Most performances cost £16 for adults and £10 for under-18s. Full-time students can buy tickets at the under-18 price on production of a valid student card. Groups of ten or more receive one free ticket for every ten tickets bought. Tuesday performances are offered at a reduced price of £12 for all.

Collecting your tickets
Tickets booked online are sent by email and can be shown on your phone. Tickets booked by phone are kept at the box office for collection on the day.

Returns and exchanges
We cannot give refunds once tickets have been bought. However, tickets can be exchanged for another performance of the same show, provided that you contact us no later than 48 hours before the original performance. A charge of £2 per ticket is made for each exchange. If a performance is cancelled by the theatre, a full refund will be given automatically.

Food and drink
Drinks bought at the theatre bar may be taken into the auditorium in plastic cups. Hot food may not be eaten inside the auditorium.

Children
Children under 12 must be accompanied by an adult at all performances. Some shows are not suitable for young children, so please check the age guidance on our website before booking.

Arriving late
Performances start promptly. Latecomers will be shown to their seats at a suitable break in the performance, which may not be until the interval.

Access
The theatre has level access from the street and four spaces for wheelchair users. A companion ticket is free for anyone who needs a carer with them. Please mention this when you book.

Questions 1–7

Do the following statements agree with the information given in the text above?

Write

• TRUE if the statement agrees with the information
• FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
• NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this

Read the text below and answer Questions 8–14.

Museums in and around Carlton

A The Carlton Museum
The town's main museum is in the old Wool Hall and tells the story of Carlton from prehistoric times to the present day. Entry is free, although donations are welcome. Highlights include a collection of Roman coins found by a local farmer while he was ploughing his fields, and a reconstruction of a Victorian schoolroom. The museum is closed on Mondays.

B The Mill Lane Toy Museum
This small private museum contains more than 3,000 toys from the past two hundred years, collected by one family over three generations. Children can play with copies of traditional toys in the activity room. Admission is £5 for adults and £3 for children. Opening hours are limited during the winter, so please check before you visit.

C The Railway Workshop
Run entirely by volunteers, the workshop is where old railway carriages are restored. Visitors can watch the work in progress from a viewing gallery. The workshop is open only on the first Sunday of each month. Entry is free, but there is a charge for the miniature railway rides.

D Hartfield House
A seventeenth-century country house three miles south of Carlton, with furniture and paintings from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and formal gardens that can be explored on your own. Guided tours of the house run every hour, and there is no other way to see the upstairs rooms. The house has been shut for two years while a new roof was fitted, but it reopens on 1 May.

E The Carlton Gallery
A modern gallery showing work by local and international artists, with exhibitions changing every two months. Entry to the main galleries is free, but there is a charge for some special exhibitions. Free talks about the current exhibition take place every Saturday afternoon. The gallery is fully accessible, and its café on the top floor has some of the best views in town.

Questions 8–14

Look at the five museums, A–E, above.

For which museum are the following statements true?

Write the correct letter, A–E. You may use any letter more than once.

SECTION 2 — Questions 15–27

Read the text below and answer Questions 15–20.

Hallam Engineering: Using a Company Vehicle

Employees whose work involves regular travel to customers' sites may be provided with a company van. This guidance explains your responsibilities when you use one.

Before you drive
Only employees who have been added to the company's insurance policy may drive a company vehicle. To be added, you must show the fleet manager your full driving licence, which will then be checked every six months. Before every journey, you should carry out a quick walk-round check of the vehicle, looking at the tyres, lights and mirrors. Any faults must be reported to the fleet manager before the vehicle is used. Vans are serviced at the depot every three months, and the fleet manager will tell you when your van is due.

Fuel
Each van is supplied with a fuel card, which must be used only for the vehicle it belongs to. Please keep the receipts for all fuel purchases, as these must be attached to your monthly mileage report.

Private use
Company vans may not be used for private journeys, with one exception: employees who are on call outside normal working hours may drive the van between their home and work during the period they are on call.

Mobile phones
Hand-held phones must never be used while driving, even when the van is stationary in traffic. If you need to make a call, park in a safe place and switch off the engine first.

Parking and security
When the van is parked overnight, it must be locked, and tools must not be left inside. If you do not have off-road parking at home, the van should be returned to the depot at the end of each working day.

Fines and offences
Any parking or speeding fines received while you are using a company vehicle are your personal responsibility and will not be paid by the company. Employees must also tell their manager immediately if they receive penalty points on their licence, even if this happened while driving their own car.

Accidents
If you are involved in an accident, follow the procedure in the accident reporting guide. Do not admit responsibility at the scene.

Questions 15–20

Complete the sentences below.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the text for each answer.

Read the text below and answer Questions 21–27.

Hallam Engineering: Reporting Accidents and Near Misses

Every accident at work, however minor, must be reported. We also ask staff to report near misses: events that did not cause an injury, but could easily have done so. Near misses are often the best warning we have that something needs to change, and staff who report them will never be blamed for doing so.

If someone is injured
Your first priority is to make sure that the injured person receives help. Every department has trained first aiders, whose names are displayed on the noticeboard. In a serious emergency, call an ambulance first, and then inform the site reception, so that they can direct the ambulance crew to the right place.

Recording the accident
All accidents must be entered in the accident book, which is kept at site reception, on the same day. The entry should be made by the injured person if possible. If they are unable to do this, it may be made by a witness or by their supervisor. The entry should describe what happened, where it happened and the nature of any injury, but it should not include any opinion about who was to blame.

Investigation
The health and safety manager will review every entry in the accident book within five working days. In some cases, they may arrange an investigation, and anyone who saw the accident may be asked to give a written statement. If the investigation shows that a piece of equipment was faulty, the equipment will be taken out of use until it has been repaired or replaced.

Reporting near misses
Near misses should be reported using the online form on the staff intranet. The form can be completed anonymously if you prefer. Paper copies are also available from the health and safety manager.

Training
All new staff receive a short health and safety induction during their first week, which includes a tour of the site and an explanation of these procedures. Refresher training is provided every two years.

Protective equipment
Everyone in the workshop and the yard must wear safety boots. Gloves, goggles and ear protection are provided free of charge and must be used wherever signs say so. Damaged equipment should be returned to the stores and replaced immediately.

Serious injuries
Some serious injuries must, by law, be reported to the national health and safety authority. The health and safety manager is responsible for doing this, so please make sure they are informed of any serious injury without delay.

Questions 21–27

Complete the notes below.

Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the text for each answer.

Accidents and near misses: key points

• A near miss is an event that did not lead to an 211 word .
• Staff who report near misses will not be 221 word .
• The names of first aiders can be found on the 231 word .
• In a serious emergency, contact site 241 word after calling an ambulance.
• The accident book entry should not give anyone's 251 word about who caused the accident.
• Witnesses may need to write a 261 word .
• Near misses can be reported without giving your name, using a form on the 271 word .

SECTION 3 — Questions 28–40

Read the text below and answer Questions 28–40.

Britain's pillar boxes

A Until the middle of the nineteenth century, sending a letter in Britain was complicated and expensive. The cost depended on the distance the letter travelled and the number of sheets of paper it contained, and it was usually paid by the person who received it, not the person who sent it. Because of this, some people refused to accept letters, and others avoided payment altogether by putting secret marks on the outside of a letter, which the receiver could read before handing it back unopened. In 1840, the Uniform Penny Post, championed by the reformer Rowland Hill, changed this. Any letter weighing up to half an ounce could now be sent anywhere in the country for a penny, paid in advance by the sender with the world's first postage stamp. The number of letters grew rapidly. But there was still the problem of how to post them. People had to take their letters to a post office or a receiving house, or hand them to a bellman, a postal worker who walked the streets in the evening ringing a bell to collect letters.

B The solution came from an unexpected source. The novelist Anthony Trollope, now remembered for books such as Barchester Towers, also had a long career as an official in the Post Office. Part of his job was to find ways of making collections and deliveries faster and more efficient, and he travelled widely, often on horseback, to inspect local postal services. In the early 1850s, while working in the Channel Islands, he recommended that the Post Office try out roadside letter boxes of the kind he had seen in France. The first four were installed in Jersey in November 1852, and they were so successful that the idea soon spread to the mainland. The first box in England was put up in Carlisle in 1853, and the first boxes in London appeared in 1855.

C Early pillar boxes came in a variety of colours. In 1859, the Post Office decided that all boxes should be painted green, partly so that they would blend in with their surroundings and not spoil the appearance of the streets. Unfortunately, this was so successful that people found them hard to see, and some even walked into them. In 1874, it was decided that red should become the standard colour instead. Repainting every box in the country was a slow process, and it took about ten years to complete.

D The design of the boxes changed many times. Some early boxes had a posting slot that let in rain, and its position was soon changed. One of the most admired designs was introduced in 1866 by the architect J. W. Penfold. Penfold boxes have six sides and are decorated with acanthus leaves, and many are still in use. A less successful design was produced between 1879 and 1887: by an oversight, these boxes carried neither the words "Post Office" nor the initials of the monarch, and they are known today as "anonymous" boxes.

E For anyone interested in history, a pillar box can provide a useful clue to the age of a street. Most boxes carry the royal cipher, the initials of the monarch who was on the throne when the box was made. "VR" stands for Victoria Regina, or Queen Victoria, while "GR" stands for one of the kings called George. Boxes from the short reign of Edward VIII, who gave up the throne in 1936 after less than a year, are particularly rare, and enthusiasts travel long distances to see them. Boxes in Scotland are an interesting exception. When Elizabeth II came to the throne in 1952, some Scots objected to boxes carrying the initials "EIIR", because there had never been a Queen Elizabeth of Scotland before. As a result, boxes installed in Scotland during her reign carry the Crown of Scotland instead of the royal cipher. There is even a society whose members record and photograph boxes all over the country.

F Today, there are around 115,000 post boxes in the United Kingdom, and many of the oldest are protected as listed buildings. In 2012, a number of boxes were painted gold to celebrate the home towns of British athletes who had won gold medals at the London Olympic and Paralympic Games. However, the number of letters being sent has fallen by more than half since the early 2000s, as people have turned to email and messaging. At the same time, the number of parcels has grown, as more people shop online. In response, Royal Mail has started testing new boxes into which customers can post small parcels. Most ordinary boxes still carry a small plate showing the time of the last collection, and in many places there is now only one collection a day. The pillar box, it seems, is adapting to a new age, as it has done before.

Questions 28–33

The text has six paragraphs, A–F.

Choose the correct heading for each paragraph from the list of headings below.

Write the correct number, i–viii, next to Questions 28–33.

List of Headings

• i Changing to meet new needs
• ii How a box can reveal its age
• iii The problem of lost and stolen letters
• iv An idea brought from overseas
• v A colour that worked too well
• vi Posting a letter before the boxes arrived
• vii The cost of building the first boxes
• viii Improvements, decoration and an error

Questions 34–37

Complete the sentences below.

Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the text for each answer.

Questions 38–40

Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.

• A it was the cheapest colour available.
• B it would not make the streets look less attractive.
• C it was the colour used in France.
• D it was the favourite colour of the public.

• A They were the first boxes to be painted red.
• B They have six sides and decoration in the shape of leaves.
• C They were the first boxes with a slot that kept out the rain.
• D They were made without the monarch's initials.

• A It has reduced the number of pillar boxes.
• B It has painted some boxes a new colour.
• C It is trying out boxes that can be used for small parcels.
• D It is encouraging people to send more letters.