That certainly used to be ok, but I dont beleive it is now, however I do beleive they have to honour the rules as they were at the time your car would have been first MOT'd so you might be ok on an older vehicle, no chance on a newer one though.

Some of the rules are weird, bloke I know had a car from the very early 1900s and it didnt need front brakes at all and only had a hand operated rear brake, they were only allowed to check it "operated" not what the actual values were etc, so it was essentially impossible for it to fail.

Totally unsafe car to be driving around on modern roads in, and yet totally legal, lol