The OP wrote this a few weeks ago:
My examiner was a thoroughly decent guy, who I am sure would have failed me if he found I could not fly, navigate and communicate safely.
I suppose the other comfort you should take into your skills test is that your instructer does know your abilities (or lack of!) better than you do, so if he has put you forward then you are almost certainly good enough to pass.
So if you are about to do your skills test, remember your examiner wants you to pass and your instructer already knows your good enough, so so should you.
On a slighty different note, is it me being tight or do the CAA seem to want to extort money out of us at every turn? £180.00 just to issue a PPL, I cant imagine the cost of admin plus printing the license plus reasonable profit would be a fraction of that in reality.
In fairness to other students, you ought to at least make others at Halfpenny Green aware of what the CAA have told you, and do so right away.
I wonder if you now see the £180 as a more realistic figure considering the extra work involved in finding your guy was (allegedly) out of date, rather than just issuing a licence.
I suspect that in the lawyer friendly state of California, you'd be swamped with offers to sue the "examiner" for punitive damages due to the distress and mental anguish of needing to sit your test again.