Growth and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Snape Excerpts

Monday 4th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Valentine]

Yes, indeed, it would be a national system.

[Lord Snape]

My Lords, I support my noble friend and the noble Baroness in this amendment. It is something that I personally feel strongly about. I live near Birmingham in the West Midlands and I use the tolled section of the motorway quite frequently on my journeys north. It is a very convenient way of missing the congestion that can be found around spaghetti junction and the Ray Hall viaduct, the elevated section of the M6—until one reaches the toll booths, where we have this medieval concept of queuing to pay, the sort of thing one did with a horse and cart centuries ago. Invariably, I find myself behind someone who has got in the wrong lane, or someone who does not have the right money or cannot find their credit card, and a lot of the time saved by using the toll road is lost as one queues to get through this barrier. Surely there has to be a better way.

As the noble Baroness, Lady Valentine, said, in this day and age it should surely be possible to have a more modern system of collecting revenue for toll roads. It is 25 years since I first went to Singapore. The authorities there managed to collect congestion charges electronically three decades ago in a way that is apparently beyond us on the Midlands motorway. I ask the Minister to bear that in mind.

Perhaps I may test the patience of the Committee for two or three more minutes while I am on this hobby-horse of the Midlands motorway. At the moment it is comparatively lorry-free because the private owners—I understand that Macquarie, the Australian company, is the main shareholder in the Midlands motorway—deliberately, as a matter of policy, price off heavy goods vehicles. Those heavy goods vehicles then use the existing M6 over the elevated section at the Ray Hall viaduct and past spaghetti junction—a section of the M6 that is regularly and expensively under repair because of those very same heavy goods vehicles which, whatever the very effective road lobby says, do not pay their true track costs and do enormous damage.

Thanks to the generosity of the noble Baroness, Lady Thatcher, when she was Prime Minister in the 1980s, Macquarie was given the concession to run the Midlands motorway in perpetuity, and can charge what it likes. The last thing it wants is a non-stop procession of heavy goods vehicles, because that damages its motorway. It is no accident that the bit of motorway infrastructure regularly under repair anywhere in the country is the left-hand lane, because that is the one used by heavy goods vehicles. It is a nonsensical situation in which the British taxpayer has paid literally hundreds of millions of pounds. I know the Ray Hall viaduct quite well; it was in my former constituency of West Bromwich East. When the former Prime Minister John Major talked about the cones hotline he had the Ray Hall viaduct and the spaghetti junction interchange in mind. Miles of it are regularly coned off because of the damage done by heavy goods vehicles, which use that section of the M6 because they are deliberately priced off the Midlands motorway.

There are two matters here that I hope the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, will address. The first is the nonsensical and medieval concept of stopping to pay a toll, having used a road on which I must confess to breaking the speed limit occasionally myself. I have rarely if ever seen a police vehicle on that privately-owned section of motorway, although having said that I have no doubt I can expect to see one in the very near future. The taxpayer had to pay literally hundreds of millions of pounds because of the pricing policy on that section of toll road, which keeps off heavy goods vehicles. Both of those matters are complete nonsense. No one blames the Minister personally, but can he do anything about it?

[Lord Adonis]

My Lords, I wish my noble friend Lord Snape well in his quest to abolish all medieval practices in this country. I would simply point out that your Lordships may be the first victims of such a policy, so I hope he does not progress too fast.

[Lord Snape]

If my noble friend will allow me to say so, at least some of us in this House have occasionally sought election.

[Lord Adonis]

Of course, in medieval times exit was not a permitted right. The issue here is a very simple and straightforward one, on which I hope the noble Lord can give the Committee comfort. It is as simple as whether it is possible to have a tolling regime without having to have toll booths. The reason the issue has come to the fore is the Silvertown tunnel proposal. TfL, quite rightly, does not want to have toll booths, but the legal position is unclear. TfL tells me the issue is whether the New Roads and Street Works Act 1991 or the Greater London Authority Act is the relevant legal basis for tolling. If it is the one, then there is not a need for booths; if it is the other, then there might be. I think we all agree on what the public policy objective is here; we simply need the Government to give us comfort that it can be achieved.

Railways: Fares

Lord Snape Excerpts

Thursday 31st January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, I agree that it must be difficult for ordinary passengers to understand how ticket pricing works. The increase in regulated fares is implemented by train operators as an average across a basket of fares. This flexibility allows some fares to be increased by up to 5%—although only 2% on Southern—more than the average, while other fares must increase by much less or even be held flat to comply with the regulated average.

[Lord Snape]

Does the Minister agree that this largely synthetic row about rail fare increases takes place every year around new year, when there is not much bad news elsewhere? The British media love bad news, and it provides them with an annual story. Notwithstanding that, does the Minister agree with the figures that show that fares for travelling by train have increased in real terms by about 20% over the past decade, while the cost of motoring has reduced by 5% over that period? Are there not some inconsistencies here in government policy?

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, first, the relative prices of motoring and travelling by rail vary up and down. The comparison does vary. My right honourable friend the Secretary of State asked exactly the same question as the noble Lord about the timing of rail fare increases—and he was not amused.

Public Bodies (Abolition of the Railway Heritage Committee) Order 2013

Lord Snape Excerpts

Monday 17th December 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Berkeley]

My Lords, I add my congratulations to my noble friend Lord Faulkner. He has worked tirelessly on railway heritage. If it was not for him, we would now be in a complete mess. I was very surprised to hear the Minister say that the Railway Heritage Committee was a good example of voluntary work that has now been moved to the Science Museum. He said that it had had a bit of administrative support from the Science Museum before, or that it now has it. I cannot see what the difference is between them. It is moving the deckchairs for the sake of it. I suspect that it will cost more and do exactly the same thing; where is the benefit? My noble friend Lord Grocott talked about old steam engines. A month ago I went round the National Railway Museum in New Delhi, where most of the engines, as he said, were built in this country—largely in Glasgow—and they were very fine. I hope that this tradition continues. Of course, they now build very good engines of their own in India.

Having listened to the Minister’s explanation, which I believe lasted a good seven minutes, and to the story that my noble friend Lord Faulkner told about the work that he had to do just to move things across to the Science Museum, I am afraid that my only conclusion is: thank God he was there to do it. It will be fine in the future when the next Labour Government make things better, but this is a classic case of dogma ruling brain when it started. As my noble friend Lord Grocott said, I hope that it is not repeated.

[Lord Snape]

My Lords, I, too, join in the general chorus of discontent about the actions of the Government today. I support my noble friend Lord Faulkner and agree with his very able speech about the need to care for railway artefacts and his description of the work that the Railway Heritage Committee has done over the years. I have no personal interests to declare except that in the 1980s, along with the late Robert Adley, I served on the advisory committee to the Railway Heritage Committee, which was newly formed at that time. The work that it has done over the years is enormously commendable.

Some of the reminiscences—if I may put it like that—of my noble friend Lord Grocott apply to railway installations all over the world. However, there are many such installations still in the United Kingdom, which the Railway Heritage Committee would have been interested in seeing properly preserved. I do not suggest for a moment that transferring these matters to the Science Museum will necessarily adversely affect the future of railway heritage. However, I am conscious, as your Lordships will be conscious, that the Science Museum has lots of other things with which to concern itself. The great thing about the Railway Heritage Committee is precisely that it was concerned about our railway heritage, and worked to preserve that which we still enjoy at present and which future generations should also enjoy. I deplore and regret any diminution of that concern for our railway heritage as a result of this order.

I suspect, as did my noble friend Lord Grocott, that some civil servant somewhere drew up a list of quangos to be abolished and this one found itself on there. Even at this late hour, I urge the Government to think again. As a railwayman myself, and the son of a railwayman, I feel strongly about our railway heritage. I have bored your Lordships previously with stories about my own railway career. I point out that there are still artefacts—they can still be regarded as such—in use on the present-day modern railway which are well worth preserving. I am not sure I would have the ability, or that the Science Museum would have the time or patience, to listen to the case for preserving them. For example, there are signal boxes in the Stockport area, where I spent the early part of my career, which were built by the London and North Western Railway in the 1880s, and which still signal trains today. Do I approach the Science Museum when eventually those signal boxes are abolished, to say that these are part of our railway heritage, and ought to be kept?

I might say in passing that, although those of us who travel regularly on the west coast main line are familiar with the litany of equipment failures—“failure of lineside equipment” seems to be the stock response to any delays—that does not happen in the Stockport area. Thanks to the London and North Western Railway, which installed those signal boxes in 1888, they still do not have any problems, all these years later, in passing Pendolino trains through the town of Stockport. If we are properly to preserve that sort of railway heritage, we might need a wider scope than saying, “We will leave these matters to the Science Museum”.

So I ask, even at this late hour, for the Minister to reflect again. The abolition of quangos is not necessarily a bad thing, but the old proverb about babies and bath water certainly applies in this particular case.

[Lord Cormack]

My Lords, as president of the All-Party Parliamentary Arts and Heritage Group I would like to add one brief comment. First, I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Faulkner, for what he has done. Secondly, it is self-evident that the work of this committee must carry on. It is often better to allow a group of enthusiasts, who are totally dedicated to a specific thing, to carry on rather than have it subsumed within a larger organisation. I have seen this happen with the subsuming of the Historical Manuscripts Commission, on which I sat for almost 25 years, into National Archives. Although I pay tribute to what National Archives seeks to do, the specialist knowledge and specific determination that were embodied in the commission have largely gone.

When there are relatively small and perhaps even obscure groups doing a very good job, it is a pity to sweep them away in the name of quango-clearing. This was not a costly quango: it was a body of dedicated enthusiasts doing a good job.

--- Later in debate ---

Railways clearly engage the interest of the public. There is one major railway TV programme on at the present time, which consists of three episodes about the historic nature of our railways on a major channel. Even Michael Portillo has moved on from politics to show his enthusiasm for bringing Bradshaw’s up-to-date with his “Great British Railway Journeys”. In doing so, he identifies changes over the historical period that have occurred as far as those railway journeys are concerned.

[Lord Snape]

Would my noble friend accept that Michael Portillo, who became Minister of State in the Department of Transport with very much a right-wing image, with a brief at the time to close the Settle and Carlisle line, spent a bit of time with railway men, went to see it for himself, became the more humane character that he is today and saved the Settle and Carlisle line as a result?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Faulkner of Worcester]

My Lords, it has been a very interesting debate and I thank every noble Lord who has taken part in it. In all parts of the Chamber, there have been impressive demonstrations of support for the work of the Railway Heritage Committee, for the cause of railway heritage as a whole and, indeed, for the role of our railways in our society. I thank every noble Lord who has participated.

As I shall be playing a part in the work of the Science Museum advisory board, I hope very much that I will be able to satisfy the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, and my noble friend Lord Snape that in future we will do as good a job as the Railway Heritage Committee has done. I am particularly pleased that there has been such praise for the work of the Railway Heritage Committee, which I have not been a part of for the past three years. I am sure that the members of that committee will be very gratified that there is such support for the work that they have done and that their efforts are being appreciated. I have to tell noble Lords that back in 2010 they did not feel that they were being appreciated and it appeared that the committee was being abolished almost by a stroke of the pen.

My noble friend Lord Snape referred to the sterling work by Mr Michael Portillo in saving the Settle to Carlisle line. If he is interested, and if I might be allowed a small commercial, your Lordships will find in the Library a book, of which I am the co-author, that was published last week called Holding the Line: How Britain’s Railways Were Saved, in which the saving of the Settle to Carlisle line is described in some detail.

[Lord Snape]

Can my noble friend assure me that I get a mention? Otherwise I will not read it.

[Lord Faulkner of Worcester]

The noble Lord, Lord Snape, has a very good mention in it, which I hope that he will appreciate; not least because he was the source of information that has subsequently appeared in it.

The Minister has asked me not to press my amendment. I am getting pressure from behind me to do that but, in view of the fact that the Government have moved a very considerable distance, and I certainly do not want to fall out with the Minister, who has been extraordinarily helpful, as has his colleague the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Holbeach, I do not intend to press it this afternoon. I will read very carefully what the Minister has said about the review to be conducted by the DCMS within three years; that is the first time that we have heard that. We will study those words very carefully, and if this can lead to a future new statutory instrument, then that will solve the problem. It is a missed opportunity but it is a great deal better than where we were in 2010. I beg leave to withdraw.

Railways: London Midland Rail Franchise

Lord Snape Excerpts

Wednesday 31st October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, I share the noble Lord’s concerns regarding passenger experience. He is right that the problem relates to a shortage of drivers and the ability of London Midland to retain the drivers it has and attract new drivers. It is a competitive market. There is also a considerable lead time for taking on and training new drivers. This is a matter for London Midland. However, there are strong incentives for it to put the situation right.

[Lord Snape]

My Lords, is the Minister aware that since being granted a franchise London Midland has never recruited enough drivers or train crew generally, including conductors? Through the period of the franchise it has relied on its staff working rest days, Sundays and voluntary overtime in order to maintain the service. Without knowing the actual benchmarks to which the Minister referred, can he explain why on one day this year it cancelled no fewer than 100 services because of a lack of train crew? Is it not about time we did something to change this franchisee before all of us in the West Midlands take to our motor cars permanently?

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, it would be premature to terminate the franchise at this point. There are severe penalties for breach of franchise. The noble Lord’s analysis of the problem may be right. However, it is important to understand that all train operating companies rely on rest-day working but only to the extent of about 3% or thereabouts, whereas this operator is now in the region of 6%. A shortage of drivers causes a serious problem for that operator but it is the train operating company’s problem.

West Coast Main Line

Lord Snape Excerpts

Monday 29th October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

The noble Lord makes an important point about the human element of this problem. I take this opportunity to make it quite clear that the front-line staff will not be adversely affected. It will be the same staff running the trains and the same rolling stock. In the short term, passengers will not notice any difference. As I said in the Statement, we may even be able to enhance the service. However, it is important to remember that there is a human element to this problem.

[Lord Snape]

My Lords, will the Minister accept some sympathy from me for having to deliver that preprepared Statement? It referred to the Government having been “frank and open” about this shambles, as my noble friend on the Front Bench rightly called it. Does the Minister accept that the Government have behaved in no such way and that, up to hours before the revelations emerged as a result of the proposals for judicial review, the previous Secretary of State and her successor were assuring us all that the contract was robust and that no problems were foreseen?

I wish to press the noble Earl on the question of cost, to which my noble friend on the Front Bench referred. None of us for a moment believes that the costs will be confined to the £40 million of the existing franchise. Has the department, for example, received any communication from FirstGroup, which was previously awarded this franchise and whose share price has declined by 20% since the emergence of the fact that the system was flawed? How much does the Minister estimate this whole thing is going to cost the British taxpayer? I repeat the noble Lord’s plea that in future the front-line staff who have to operate the west coast main line be kept fully informed about what is happening.

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, as for the noble Lord’s last point, the staff on the west coast main line are of course the responsibility of Virgin. I assure the House that I have repeated many political Statements, and I have done so this time again without the opportunity of editing it because I am just repeating a Statement made by my right honourable friend in another place. As to the noble Lord’s substantive point about when my right honourable friend knew that there was a problem, as soon as he was told that the problem could have affected the outcome he cancelled the award of the contract immediately.

Bus Industry

Lord Snape Excerpts

Thursday 18th October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Snape]

My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw. I do not have any financial interests to declare in these matters. I should point out that I chair the Bus Appeals Board, which is a purely voluntary post and I have over the years worked for both the National Express Group and First Group on the bus side.

The noble Lord started his speech by referring to the two important factors in running bus services being punctuality and reliability. Unlike him, I am not sure which piece of legislation he was referring to but I am sure that he would agree with me that these matters are largely the responsibility of highways authorities, outside passenger transport executive areas or passenger transport executives—the integrated transport authorities as we are now to know them—within our major cities. I hope that when the Minister replies, he will agree with me that punctuality and reliability do not depend on ownership of bus companies.

I find it depressing that people in my own party, in particular, continually call for reregulation although it is more than 25 years since buses were deregulated. Since then, we have had the back end of a Conservative Government, 13 years of a Labour Government and now two and a half years of a coalition Government, and the 1986 Act has not been repealed. We should make the best of what we have. In many parts of the country, not only are bus services thriving, there are lots of successes to point to without getting into arguments of ownership and reregulation.

I spent most of my working life in the bus industry, although that is a rather flattering description of someone who was chairman of a bus company. Many people who drove buses would not have regarded the chairman as being part of their working lives. But I did mix with them and held a PSV, as it was known at the time. In the West Midlands there has been a considerable number of successes in bus operations that have continued in recent years. Within the past year Centro and a passenger transport authority, or the ITA as it now is, and National Express, the predominant operator in the area, signed a ground-breaking agreement that commits the two organisations to working closely together to drive forward about £25 million worth of improvements for bus passengers across the West Midlands within two years. These commitments from both sides—certainly as far as National Express is concerned— include the introduction of more than 300 new, greener buses, improved onboard cleanliness, a smart card system similar to London’s Oyster card and upgrades to bus shelters and other waiting facilities. They also include more real-time information screening, which will be a great boon to anyone waiting for a bus, specially designed shelters and infrastructures, new passenger information systems, onboard announcements —on which I am not madly keen but they are obviously the thing of the future—improvements to the safety and security arrangements for passengers and the introduction of 40 hybrid electric buses to the region.

However, there is a lack of enforcement of the existing legislation, particularly in regard to bus lane provision. In London we are fortunate: there are lots of buses and most motorists know—they soon find out if they do not—that straying into a bus lane will be immediately followed by a minimum £60 fine. Why do we not have that level of enforcement throughout the country? I presume that is the part of the Act to which the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, referred.

[Lord Bradshaw]

Perhaps I may extend that. I am particularly concerned about yellow-box junctions and right turns, which are clogging the roads. Local authorities need to have the power to deal with moving traffic offences. They can film the offence but they cannot do anything about it.

[Lord Snape]

I am grateful for that clarification. I agree entirely with the noble Lord. Why are not the benefits that bus operators and passengers enjoy in London extended to the rest of the country? I hope that when the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, replies he will be able to give us some comfort on this matter. The greenest, most modern buses are not doing the job for which they are designed if they are stuck in traffic. We are not going to persuade people to get out of their cars and on to public transport if that bus is stuck in the same traffic jam as their own cars.

However, it is not all bad news. I hope the noble Earl and my noble friend on the Front Bench will acknowledge that one rarely hears mention of bus passengers in these debates. The noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, hazarded a guess that not many Ministers travel by bus. I suggest that many Members of your Lordships’ House do so, if only because most of us have reached the age where we get a financial benefit out of doing so.

If one were to ask bus passengers about the standard of service, one might be pleasantly surprised by the reaction. Passenger Focus recently commissioned a nationwide survey of various companies and sought the opinion of bus passengers. I will cite the Go Ahead group survey. I do not think it operates in my part of the world and I have never worked for it, so I cannot be accused of bias. Among more than 3,000 Go Ahead passengers consulted in the survey, there was an 86% satisfaction level. Would any Government of the day receive such satisfaction levels from the populace at large?

Go North-East, a subsidiary of Go Ahead, had an 88% satisfaction level. I mention this because Nexus, the ITA in the north-east, is, I understand, most anxious to introduce a quality contract. Under the terms of the quality contract the ITA will set both fares and standards of service. I do not know whether Nexus or anyone else has asked passengers in the north-east what they think, but if 88% are satisfied with the service currently provided, it is difficult to imagine that local authority involvement would lead to any greater satisfaction. I will be interested to hear the views of both Front Benches on that matter.

Like the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, I believe that we should express concern about the price of bus travel, particularly for young people and those seeking employment. All too often Ministers in the present Government—the Chancellor of the Exchequer immediately comes to mind—refer to the unemployed as though somehow it is their fault. When you talk to people who are unemployed—most of us who were in the other place have served the unemployed—the passion, commitment and desire for regular work inspires many of them. However, it is an expensive business to travel to interviews. Only last week a woman told me about going to two interviews here in this city, both of which were held early in the day. That meant she had to pay £10.77 to travel around London because she had to leave during the morning rush hour. Had the interviews been scheduled slightly later in the day, the cost would have been £7-something. For many in your Lordships’ House that £3 would not make much difference, but the unemployed have to decide how best to spend their benefits and it can make a considerable difference.

The Minister will tell me if I am wrong, but I understand that it is possible for people to claim the cost of travel to job interviews. I am told that it is an enormously bureaucratic matter to do so and that it is necessary to jump through all sorts of hoops. Surely the Department for Transport and the department for employment, whatever it is called these days, could sit down and provide some sort of travel voucher for the unemployed to use when they are seeking work. I realise that getting two departments under any Government to discuss financial allocations is the equivalent of the Korean peace talks at Pyongyang, which have lasted for over 50 years, but it ought to be possible to find a less bureaucratic and more humane system than what we have at present.

Unaccountably we have 90 minutes for this debate, but we have been told that we are limited to 10 minutes. Perhaps someone better versed in the rules of your Lordships’ House could explain that, since only four of us are participating. The noble Lord touched on other matters, particularly the distribution of the bus service operators grant. I do not think the Government are aware of the difference between running rural and urban services. The rural bus network is in grave danger of being decimated over the next few years if the changes to BSOG continue. It is an open secret that the Treasury has always regarded BSOG as a subsidy well worth cutting, and having reduced it in the 2011 Budget, there is an intention to actually abolish it before 2015. Such an abolition will lead to the complete decimation of bus services both urban and rural, but particularly in rural areas. It strikes me that the Government will be committing electoral suicide in many areas that are regarded as traditionally Conservative if BSOG is cut further.

I have now exhausted my time. There is some good news about bus service provision, and I hope that my noble friend on the Front Bench will avoid the view—not expressed by passengers—that the simple answer to any problems are quality contracts and reregulation. That is not the view of those who use the bus to get from A to B.

[Lord Rosser]

My Lords, in the light of the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, I am not sure whether I am required as a bus user both in London and outside London to declare an interest in this debate. I also suspect, having listened to the contribution of my noble friend Lord Snape, that there will be little support behind me, at least from those who have spoken, for what I have to say. But, nevertheless, we proceed.

This is neither the best attended debate nor a debate that has attracted a large number of speakers. However, its subject matter is of considerable importance since more people travel by bus than travel by every other form of public transport combined. I am grateful to the Library of the House for the comprehensive and helpful briefing pack it has provided. Before I go any further I would like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, for giving us an opportunity to discuss developments in the bus industry. One development was a Competition Commission report on the industry outside London, which found that what it described as widespread market segregation had occurred as a result of operator behaviour.

However, the bus industry also has much about which it can be pleased. The 2012 bus passenger survey by Passenger Focus, the official passenger watchdog, found that on average 85% of passengers in England, excluding London, were satisfied with their bus journeys. My noble friend Lord Snape, whose advocacy of and support for buses knows no bounds, referred to the survey.

The chairman of Passenger Focus also commented that while overall passenger satisfaction across the surveyed areas was at a consistently high level, bus passengers rated almost all other specific journey factors lower, with wide disparities in ratings of value for money not only between different areas but between different operators and services in the same area.

The Library briefing pack includes a section on the policy of the coalition Government. It points out that the coalition agreement made one mention of bus services when it stated that the Government would,

“encourage joint working between bus operators and local authorities”.

That is a little vague—no doubt because the Conservatives in opposition had proposed regulation and the introduction of quality contracts, whereas the Liberal Democrats stated in their manifesto that they would,

“give councils greater powers to regulate bus services according to community needs, meaning local people get a real say over routes and fares”.

[Lord Snape]

Will my noble friend tell the House how many quality contracts were made during the period of office of the previous Labour Government?

[Lord Rosser]

As I understand it, there were no quality contracts. The legislation was amended in 2008 because the previous legislation has made it an enormous mountain to climb to implement quality contracts. The noble Lord himself made reference to the local transport authorities that are currently seeking to pursue quality contracts in accordance with the legislation.

At Second Reading in the House of Commons of what became the Local Transport Act 2008, the Liberal Democrats said:

“The concept of having partnerships and contracts is right”.—[Official Report, Commons, 26/3/08; col. 220.]

[Lord Rosser]

I note what the noble Lord said, but I am quoting from what his party said in the House of Commons—that the concept of having partnerships and contracts was right. If he is now saying that he does not agree with the statement made by his own party in opposition, of course he is welcome to do so. It is clear that on the issue of contracts, the Conservative Party view has prevailed and the Liberal Democrats have shifted their ground, even though the Minister responsible for the bus industry is a Liberal Democrat.

The bus industry, certainly outside London, is facing a difficult time. The cut in local transport funding of some 28% has led to local authorities cutting back on support for local bus services, and subsidies paid direct to bus companies have also been cut by the Government by one-fifth. In some rural areas, council-supported services make up nearly all the network, yet many of those who use buses have no other means of transport. Cutting a bus route or bus services can cut an opportunity to take up employment or to stay on in education and go to college. That hardly seems consistent with the Government’s declared policy of making it easier to gain skills and take up employment.

We have already set out the significant tranche of cuts to the Department for Transport’s budget that we would have accepted to meet our own commitment to halve the deficit in this Parliament. However, unlike this Government, we would have protected support for local bus services. While the level of financial support from government is very important, it is not the only factor that affects the availability and affordability of local bus services. The ability of local transport authorities to play a role on behalf of passengers, and potential passengers, matters as well.

In government, we legislated to enable transport authorities to, in effect, reregulate buses through the use of quality partnerships, which have led to very successful agreements in some areas, or quality contracts. But the experience of some of the ITAs that have begun to use these powers, particularly in relation to quality contracts, suggests that we did not go far enough. Efforts to introduce quality contracts by integrated transport authorities have been met with specific threats by one of our major national bus companies to close bus depots and sack drivers.

We need measures, which are not currently available, that would provide some protection to enable transport authorities that want to go down the road of quality contracts to do so without facing a long drawn-out and potentially costly process, and even then still face the prospect of being frustrated for no good reason. It should be for the transport authorities, which have a rather wider role and responsibility for the provision of transport within their areas than the bus companies, to decide whether a quality partnership or a quality contract will best deliver their goals and policy objectives on behalf of those whom they represent, and they should not be impeded in achieving either the quality partnership or a quality contract by actions designed to frustrate by either bus companies or indeed government—which I will come on to.

As the recent House of Commons Transport Select Committee report said, in a fairly lengthy but important quote:

“The Quality Contract option is a legitimate one for a local authority to choose. It must also be seen as credible in order to enable the local authorities to apply pressure in cases where competition or partnerships are not working satisfactorily. Local bus operators should not seek to frustrate moves towards a Quality Contract. That no local authority has implemented a Quality Contract more than a decade after the provisions were introduced suggests that there are significant hurdles to overcome, particularly for the first local authority to go down this route. The legislation itself, as amended by the Local Transport Act 2008, seems satisfactory but the process is still lengthy and risky”.

The Select Committee went on to say:

“We recommend that the Government makes the Better Bus Areas funding available, in principle, to support Quality Contracts as well as partnership schemes”.

However, that is precisely what the Government are not doing. The Minister responsible for buses has decided to exclude transport authorities that pursue quality contracts from accessing the Government’s better bus areas fund, to which the Government are implementing the commitment to devolve bus subsidies. The various strands of bus funding should be brought together in a single pot, which could then come under the democratic control of transport authorities.

However, the Government’s decision on access to the better bus areas fund is obviously designed to make it financially difficult, if not impossible, for local transport authorities that wish to go down the road of quality contracts to do so. How can the Government say that they are in favour of devolving powers and yet be prepared to penalise those authorities that decide they wish to pursue tendering, which they are entitled to do under the law? Tendering as an option is not such a radical idea. It is commonplace in much of Europe as well as in London, where a Conservative mayor has not shown any enthusiasm for dismantling the system. In fact, some of the operators opposed to quality contracts in this country are subsidiaries of wider groups that regularly bid for and secure contracts in Europe.

[Lord Snape]

Can my noble friend tell your Lordships’ House whether or not our party is now in favour of the London experience being spread countrywide, and has he cleared such a commitment with the shadow Chancellor?

[Lord Rosser]

I did not say that we are in favour of it being spread countrywide, full stop. What I have said is that it should be up to the transport authorities to decide whether to go down the road of quality partnerships or quality contracts, as they are entitled to under current legislation.

We need to protect the funding for bus services. We also need stronger transport authorities accountable for decisions over fares and services to the communities they serve, and with the confidence to decide freely what kind of relationship they want with bus operators. Unfortunately, the Government have decided to go in exactly the opposite direction.

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend Lord Bradshaw for tabling this debate. The noble Lord, Lord Snape, asked why there is a 10-minute Back-Bench speaking limit. That was a decision of the Procedure Committee approved by your Lordships’ House. It is a shame that there are not more contributors, but perhaps on a Thursday afternoon we can understand why.

[Lord Snape]

Will the Minister then use his enormous influence to see that when there is next a 90-minute debate and there are only a few of us, we can take 90 minutes instead of gabbling through everything in 10?

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, I can assure the House that noble Lords have been challenging enough in the debate so far without it being extended.

Buses play a vital role in our economy. Sixty-three per cent of all public transport trips are made on local buses, a total of 2.3 billion bus journeys in 2010-11. The bus is essential for many people to get to work and education and to visit doctors and hospitals. For many, the bus is a lifeline and, without it, they would not be able to socialise. More than half of those who rely on the bus outside London do not have access to a car.

As many noble Lords have pointed out, customer satisfaction with their bus journeys is high, with 85% of passengers being satisfied with their service. The under-21s make up a third of bus passengers and use among the over-60s is increasing as a result of the national concessionary pass. A recent study by the University of Leeds has reinforced the importance of buses to a healthy and growing economy. I was grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Snape, for his positive comments about the bus industry.

The Government remain committed to improving bus services, and expenditure on buses reflects this. This year, the Government will spend around £1 billion on the concessionary travel entitlement and £350 million in direct subsidy to bus operators in England. Another £200 million has been allocated to funding major bus projects in the past year, including improvement schemes in Bristol and Manchester.

In March, we provided £70 million through the better bus area fund to deliver improvements in 24 local authorities, £31 million to invest in low-carbon buses and the second instalment of a £20 million package to support community transport. Many bus improvement schemes have also been funded as part of the Government’s £600 million local sustainable transport fund. All this funding demonstrates how important the Government consider bus services to be.

However, the Government also recognise that improvements can and must be made, so earlier this year they outlined their plans for buses in a document entitled, Green Light for Better Buses. The proposals include reforming bus subsidy, improving competition, improving local authority capability in tendering, incentivising partnership working and multi-operator ticketing, and making bus information and ticketing easier to access for all, particularly young people. Here, I pay tribute to the work of my honourable friend Mr Norman Baker, a Minister who is absolutely committed to public transport.

There is no doubt that we are operating in challenging economic times, and this is no different for bus operators. The Government want to ensure that the bus market is still attractive to operators, both large and small, by ensuring that funding is allocated in the fairest way while giving the best value for money to taxpayers. However, we recognise the problems that are experienced by smaller operators.

The Government have recently launched a consultation on the future of the bus service operators’ grant, which is paid to bus operators—I shall say more about this in a moment. The grant is currently paid direct to bus operators in a fairly blunt and untargeted way that is related to fuel consumption. Some local authorities have told us that they can make the bus subsidy deliver better value for money by working in partnership with their bus operators to grow the bus market. That is what the better bus areas are intended to do, and the available top-up fund will give them an additional incentive to innovate.

The better bus area policy relies strongly on partnership with commercial bus operators rather than on contractual relationships. Thus, better bus areas are quite distinct from quality contract schemes where all bus services would be tendered and the bus service operators’ grant automatically devolved to local authorities. The characteristics of local bus markets vary, so different solutions will be appropriate in different local areas. The Government believe that it is for local authorities to decide which route they should pursue.

The Government are committed to protecting the national bus travel concession, which is of huge benefit to around 11 million people, allowing free off-peak travel anywhere in England. This generous concession provides older and disabled people with greater freedom, independence and a lifeline to their community. It enables access to facilities in and beyond their local area and helps these people to keep in touch with family and friends. It can also bring benefits to the wider economy.

There is no statutory obligation to provide discounted-price travel to young people but many commercial and publicly funded reductions are available. I have been encouraged to see that in Norfolk, prompted by the council’s successful bid to the better bus area fund last year, several local bus operators are working in partnership with the county council to introduce a reduced bus fare for 16 to 19 year-olds. I welcome this initiative and hope to see more like it.

I will try to answer as many questions as possible. Obviously, I will write where I am unable to do so. Both the noble Lord, Lord Snape, and my noble friend Lord Bradshaw asked me about the Traffic Management Act. Local councils and TfL already have powers to enforce moving traffic conventions, including bus lanes, cycle lanes, yellow box junctions, “no U-turns” and “no entry” signs, et cetera. Authorities outside London that have taken civil enforcement powers can enforce moving traffic conventions in bus lanes. Over 80% of authorities already have these powers. The Government support the remainder taking those powers on.

We recognise that there is a strong desire from some local authorities outside London to have all the extra powers in Part 6 of the Traffic Management Act to enforce all types of moving traffic offences, as those in London do. We are considering this, but Ministers want to be sure of the traffic benefits of extending these powers outside London and have therefore written to Nottingham and Sheffield as part of the city deals process, proposing some projects to analyse the traffic benefits of implanting Part 6 in these regions.

The noble Lord, Lord Rosser, asked about funding a quality contract through a better bus area. Areas intending to pursue a quality contract scheme may also choose to pursue a better bus area. However, we would need to understand how this would work, both with and without a quality contract. Moreover, BBAs are strongly based on a consensual approach with bus operators. Again, we need to understand how this would work in a quality contract area where the bus operators could easily change. This is a consultation and we are interested to know whether and how this could work.

My noble friend Lord Bradshaw talked about the cost of bus fares and suggested that they are too high and rising. Overall, fares were the same level in March 2011 as in March 2010, with a 2% decrease in non-metropolitan areas and increases of 0.9% in metropolitan areas and 1.4% in London. Across the country, fares can be quite variable, with a wide range of ticket types.

The noble Lord, Lord Snape, talked about the problems of young people and high fares. Of course, bus fares can be a high proportion of a young person’s income. The noble Lord talked about the problems of job hunting and suggested that we needed a simpler process for young unemployed people to claim their travel expenses. The Department for Work and Pensions provides a range of support with travel costs for the unemployed through Jobcentre Plus, which is best placed to decide who needs support with transport costs.

My noble friend Lord Bradshaw asked what was being done to reduce antisocial behaviour on public transport. I recently experienced an extremely distressing incident on a train, so I know how much of a problem this is. A wide variety of people and organisations are involved in helping to reduce antisocial behaviour and to deal with it when it occurs. These may be transport operators, local authorities, local police and PTEs, Transport for London, town centre managers, and many others. They may deliver measures in partnership with or through others, such as voluntary organisations.

The department has convened a public transport crime liaison group, chaired by my honourable friend Norman Baker, bringing together passenger representative groups, police, local authorities and operators to hear about their work on reducing crime and to share best practice. I recognise that this is a serious problem.

My noble friend Lord Bradshaw talked about the problem of increased fuel prices of 58% due to the decrease in BSOG. We are determined to bring down the deficit. BSOG must help to achieve that, and the 20% reduction did just that. We are now looking at making the remaining BSOG more efficient.

[Lord Snape]

How much has the deficit been increased or reduced by freezing fuel duty for motorists generally?

[Earl Attlee]

That is a rather wider question, and I would be delighted to write to the noble Lord on that.

My noble friend Lord Bradshaw talked about ring-fencing BSOG. It is vital that local authorities have flexibility to use funds to best effect. However, it is also important not to get turbulence in the bus market when changes take place as we reform the BSOG, so we will ring-fence BSOG for tendered buses for a transitional period.

The noble Lord, Lord Snape, asked about BSOG in rural areas. There are no plans to cut BSOG total. BSOG for tendered services will be devolved to local transport authorities. There are lots of them in rural areas, and therefore more flexibility for local authorities best to support bus services as they see fit. Commercial BSOG outside BBAs will remain the same for now, but how we apply it will be reviewed later.

My noble friend Lord Bradshaw asked how much the Competition Commission inquiry cost the taxpayer. I do not have the figure to hand, but I will write to him. He also asked about better bus area bids excluding population areas under 100,000. We have yet to issue guidance on the criteria for designating BBAs for devolved BSOG. However, we will be looking for proposals that can help to grow the economy and reduce carbon emissions. BBA 2012 was mainly aimed at large urban areas as being more able to meet the criteria.

The final point that I can address is whether there is any incentive for better bus speeds to take driver management systems, such as RIBAS, into account when bus systems are assessed. The criteria against which better bus area bids were judged included reduction in carbon emissions, which indirectly would offer a potential incentive for operators to use driver management systems such as RIBAS, given their positive impact on fuel efficiency and carbon emissions. The long-term goal of decoupling bus subsidy from fuel consumption will incentivise greater fuel efficiency within bus service operator fleets, which, in turn, should incentivise the use of driver management systems.

Rail: Great Western Passenger Franchise

Lord Snape Excerpts

Tuesday 31st January 2012 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, the bidders are able to take into account the condition of the rolling stock when they bid, with the exception of the IEP rolling stock, which they have to adopt. We need to avoid telling the bidders which rolling stock they have to use because otherwise that would compromise their negotiations with the ROSCOs.

[Lord Snape]

My Lords, will the Minister consider something revolutionary so far as this and other franchises are concerned? The franchisee should set the fares, tackle overcrowding and run a proper financial risk for the length of the franchise; under the present system, the Government set the fares, the leasing companies own the trains and, if anything goes wrong, the so-called franchisee hands in the keys and the taxpayer picks up the Bill. Does he agree that, whatever system we have at the moment for running trains, franchising it certainly ain’t?

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, I hope that the noble Lord contributes to the consultation, because he makes some valid points.

Railways: High-speed Rail

Lord Snape Excerpts

Tuesday 10th January 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Snape]

My Lords, as a founder member of the All-Party Parliamentary Rail Group in the other place and its first chairman, I congratulate the Minister on the Statement that he has repeated today. I further congratulate the Government on having the courage to go ahead with this project, which they have inherited from their predecessors, in the face of some pretty virulent opposition from people who could perhaps be regarded as traditional supporters of the noble Earl’s political party. I also support my noble friend on the Front Bench in his plea that the Government should look again at the question of the first hybrid Bill. The Minister will be aware that these Bills take many months, if not years, to get through both Houses, and the thought of two or three of these Bills is not going to speed up the project in the way that he might like.

Finally, how much is the new tunnel through the Chilterns going to cost? Some estimates suggest that it will be around £500 million. Does he agree that that is a pretty steep price to pay in order to keep the Welsh Secretary in the Cabinet? Is it not just as well that she is the only member of the Cabinet who has threatened resignation over this project, otherwise the total bill could well have been doubled?

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, the noble Lord asked about the cost of the extra tunnelling. I do not have the full details, but they will be set out in the accompanying literature. A CD of the large bundle of documents that I have is available and I will ensure that all noble Lords who take part in these debates are given a copy of it. I am advised that the extra tunnelling through the Chilterns is cost neutral.

Severe Winter Weather

Lord Snape Excerpts

Monday 20th December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, yet again a noble Lord rightly raises the importance of Heathrow Airport and the fact that most of the time it is running at 98 per cent efficiency, along with the fact that we are not going to have a third runway at Heathrow. What we will do is to make Heathrow Airport more effective and more efficient.

[Lord Snape]

My Lords, will the Minister pay tribute to those staff, many of them manual workers and low paid workers, right across the transport industries, who have spent the past week or so working in extremely inclement weather to try to maintain some sort of service. To follow on from the point made by his noble friend Lord Dholakia, does he agree that the most irritating aspect of the delay and dislocation is not the fact that things go wrong, because we can all accept the case that they do, but the lack of information to passengers or customers, or whatever the industry likes to call them? Will he accept that industries such as the railway industry—I suspect that this is true of the aviation industry, too—whether publicly or privately owned, are overmanaged and undersupervised? The largely junior staff who have to face the ire of the public are no wiser about what is going on than the people concerned. Would he knock a few heads together to ensure that senior managers are there to make decisions and to face the travelling public when things go wrong?

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, first, the noble Lord talked about manual workers working in the cold. These people are working outside in absolutely freezing conditions to keep transport equipment working, and I think we should all be very grateful to them. Yet again, another noble Lord has raised the issue of the lack of information about what transport services can do. Ministers are acutely aware of this problem; we are not happy about it. I also stress the point that we must not interfere at the moment but, when it is all over, we will be talking very closely with the transport industry to see what can be done in future so that passengers know what can be done.

Roads: Long and Heavy Vehicles

Lord Snape Excerpts

Wednesday 1st December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, before responding to that question, I should first declare an interest as I know Mr Dick Denby, who is a proponent of a longer and heavier vehicle. I have also received engineering advice from his designer on a pro bono basis. Mr Denby has done the country a great service by opening up this issue. As a result, this Government and our predecessor have been looking at a small increase in the length of an articulated vehicle to address precisely the concern of my noble friend: that low-density goods are bulking out, rather than grossing out, our current range of goods vehicles.

[Lord Snape]

My Lords, does the Minister accept that it is the heaviest goods vehicles that directly abstract traffic from rail freight? Will he accept from me that, for years, the road haulage industry has been claiming spuriously that heavier and longer goods vehicles would mean fewer of them? Does he agree that the heaviest goods vehicles have, for over 30 years, failed to pay their true track costs, and does he accept that any acceptance of longer and heavier vehicles will cause even more damage to Britain’s roads, which will be paid for by other taxpayers?

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, most of what the noble Lord says is right. We are looking at an increase in the cubic capacity of an articulated vehicle, but we have absolutely no intention of increasing the gross weight of a goods vehicle, for precisely the reasons that the noble Lord explained.