A14 Cambridge-Huntingdon Upgrade

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Thursday 19th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

I am grateful for the opportunity to consider in the House the very important issue of the problems caused by the diversions implemented during the A14 Cambridge to Huntingdon upgrade. This really matters to my constituents. One has contacted me today to say they have moved house because of the upset, and another emailed me this morning promising to tune in to this debate from where they are hiking in the Arctic circle; I hope it does not disappoint.

This road upgrade is important and long overdue. It is managed by Highways England, which I was pleased to meet some weeks ago when I went on site to discuss these issues. Anyone driving along the A14 at the moment, albeit often in a queue, cannot fail to be impressed by the scale of the works. Given that regular users have often been in queues over many years, and that there have been too many accidents and delays, most are agreed that the works are essential, and that, despite the current misery being caused, there will be substantial benefits. Let me also say at the outset that at my meeting with Highways England I was impressed by the knowledge and dedication of the many people involved; it is a huge and complicated operation, and everyone wants it to go well.

The purpose of this debate, however, is to highlight the unintended consequences for many who are affected during the construction, and to question whether enough is being done to mitigate those consequences. In my view, my constituents are paying a very heavy price in terms of their current quality of life to possibly improve the lives of others in the future. That is not fair, and I trust the Minister will hear that message loud and clear, and offer not just sympathy and kind words—which I am sure she will—but real action to stop the misery currently being endured.

The existing A14 trunk road between Cambridge and Huntingdon is well known for congestion and delays, and around 85,000 vehicles use this stretch of the A14 every day, many more than the road was originally designed to take. Around a quarter of this traffic comprises heavy goods vehicles, well above the national average for this type of road, and this adds to the need for an upgrade. It is a key east-west freight route—freight which many of us believe would be better off on the railways, but that is a debate for another day.

I will start by running through the history of this upgrade. The A14 has a chequered history over the Cambridge to Huntingdon section, with plans to upgrade going through various announcements, cancellations and re-announcements. I pay tribute to John Bridge of the Cambridgeshire chambers of commerce, who has devoted years of his life to campaigning for these improvements; indeed, there probably should be a bridge named after him. And I will now give an abridged account of what has happened.

Proposals were first made to widen the A14 between Bar Hill and Huntingdon in the late 1980s and were reviewed in 1998 as part of the Cambridge to Huntingdon multi-modal study, or CHUMMS. For many years, CHUMMS became a part of many of our lives. In 2005, the Highways Agency, as it then was, unveiled plans for widening the road from Fen Drayton to Fen Ditton, with the route unveiled in March 2007. This was originally planned to be completed and in use by 2016—what a wonderful thought—and the cost at that time was between £690 million and £1.2 billion, a far cry from the £2 billion-plus that we are now having to pay. Around this time, the Labour Government of the day also approved the guided bus route, designed to relieve some of the pressure on the road. It was controversial, not least because it was only guided until it met city-centre congestion;. It is the longest guided busway in the world but has cost much more than anticipated, although it has taken some of the strain and is now very heavily used.

When the coalition Government came to power in 2010, the scheme was duly cancelled by the Conservative-Liberal Democrat Administration. After much lobbying, we then had an interesting diversion when local councils were urged to make contributions from their declining funds, which the ever-helpful Liberal Democrat administration in Cambridge declined to do. David Cameron then famously told BBC “Look East”—I think he was speaking to Andrew Sinclair at the time—that the scheme would not be built unless the A14 became a toll road, but, like a number of things David Cameron said, it did not turn out quite as planned, as his suggestion provoked a furious backlash across eastern England.

There was further prevarication, before the scheme was officially cancelled—until a new version was developed the following year. In November 2012, the scheme was reported to be back in action, and it was mentioned in the June 2013 spending review. In May 2016, the then Transport Secretary, the right hon. Member for Derbyshire Dales (Sir Patrick McLoughlin), approved it, and it is now due for completion in March 2021, by which time the country might well look rather different.

Those were the funding sagas that we dealt with. At the same time, various planning objections were lodged, which added further delays, but the scheme is clearly essential, and the Huntingdon flyover is now in a serious state of disrepair, so it was clear that something had to be done. However, this means that it is now much more expensive than it would have been in 2010, and many more years of misery have been endured since then. It is clearly a relief that the scheme is finally under way, but it is unacceptable that people in Cambridge are being made to suffer because of problems with the diversion, particularly through this long hot summer. Of course, many people outside the city are also suffering, particularly in the surrounding villages, but I will focus my remarks on my constituents who have made their experiences and feelings very clear.

This upgrade, although necessary, is unrelenting, with Highways England telling me that overnight road closures will continue five nights a week until September. Highways England’s official overnight diversion strategy adds 30 or more miles to the journeys of those driving lorries across the country, taking them along a strategic diversion route that includes the M11, the A505 and the A11 back to junction 36 on the A14, so it is unsurprising that some drivers choose to short-cut through Cambridge, along Kings Hedges Road, Milton Road, Victoria Road, Newmarket Road, Histon Road and Huntingdon Road.

However, this short-cut is unacceptable as it disrupts the lives of my constituents—to whom I am grateful for making me aware of the situation—particularly tireless local campaigners such as Doug Whyte and Elaine Gristwood, who recently presented me with a petition from local residents who are affected. This involves virtually every house along the route, and I in turn presented the petition to Highways England. They and residents on other routes have explained the effects of the diversions on our communities. Heavy goods vehicles are driving through small streets that are profoundly unsuited to heavy loads, such as Victoria Road, and it cannot be right that my constituents cannot sleep with their windows open owing to the noise, that children have had trouble sleeping through the racket on the nights before their exams, or that constituents have reported health problems, including one who got in touch to say that the increased fumes along Kings Hedges Road had had health implications for her husband, leading to asthma attacks. I also want to pay tribute to local Labour county councillors Jocelynne Scutt and Claire Richards, who have worked tirelessly with residents to try to find solutions to this problem.

I want to quote a few pieces of correspondence that I have received from constituents. One woman has told me:

“Adequate amounts of sleep are impossible with lorries thundering past every minute, and this is severely affecting my quality of life, mood, and effectiveness at work. My whole flat shakes every time an HGV goes past. It’s like a miniature earthquake, and I’m worried the building is not designed to deal with this kind of strain.”

Another has told me:

“Before the A14 closures I had laid down a brand new driveway for my property; this included laying down concrete for it. Due to the HGVs going down the road it has created cracks in my brand new driveway, and with the lorries going down the road frequently it will just get worse. So on top of not being able to have a peaceful night sleep, the house shaking causing things to break in the house, the outside of our house is also cracking.”

It is clear that the situation cannot go on. We need stronger disincentives for the HGVs that ignore the official diversion and hurtle through the city’s streets. Of course, I have considerable sympathy for the drivers who have a maximum number of hours that they can drive before legally needing breaks, and I understand the time pressures on them and their employers and the extra costs that long diversions bring, but the improvements in future journey times and fewer delays will help those hauliers. They will benefit in a way that my currently suffering constituents will not. Many of my constituents were initially forgiving of the disruption, accepting that it was part of the A14 upgrade, which they appreciate is vital.

--- Later in debate ---

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—(Mims Davies.)

[Daniel Zeichner]

A lack of information from Highways England about when and for how long the disruptions would last created a great sense of frustration for them. Information communication has improved a little throughout the process, but it could have been got right from the outset.

When the works began, the original problem was that the signage for the diversion was widely felt to be inadequate, and it was argued that drivers were failing to divert because they just did not understand the signs. The signage has been improved, but it should have been better from the beginning. Now that it has improved, it seems that too many drivers are just ignoring it, and those who choose to ignore these signs should face consequences.

I have so far not been particularly critical of those involved in the project, but I have to question why, months after it started, we have only now been promised data on how effective or not the diversions are. Anecdotally, I am told that residents are counting over 100 HGVs an hour in the middle of the night, and Doug Whyte contacted me this morning to say that he was being kept awake last night by heavy trucks passing every few minutes. Why should residents be doing the counting? On a £2 billion project, will the Minister tell me why Highways England is not collecting that data and making it available? I am told by the county council that an HGV counter has been installed on one road but not others, yet we still do not have that data—despite repeated requests. Only with that data can we tell whether improved signage has or has not had any impact.

Frankly, Highways England should have been able to predict the problems that we are seeing and should have established base data before it started and then monitored it, and I hope the Minister will explain why it did not do that. If she cannot, I will offer her a cynical view that I am hearing: no one cares unless local people kick up enough fuss to force others into action. Will the Minister please guarantee counters on all the affected roads, and will she promise to publish the data on a weekly basis? Does she have any of that data this afternoon? How many HGVs does she expect to be using Kings Hedges Road, Milton Road, Huntingdon Road, Victoria Road and other roads this evening? I hope she has an answer, because expecting Doug and Elaine to stay up all night counting trucks is really not good enough.

What else could be done? The county council has considered temporary traffic orders, but considering them is not enough. It needs to get on and do it to at least give some of these areas relief. What of enforcement and the role of the police? We know, sadly, that traffic policing has virtually disappeared under this Government, and that is backed up by the fact that Highways England offered to pay for more policing for the diversion. Even with that offer, however, it seems that there simply are not enough officers to make it a possibility. Even if we could get the enforcement in place, are the fines sufficient to act as a disincentive to those taking shortcuts? Perhaps we need to name and shame the hauliers who consistently break the rules. There is a whole range of things that could be done but, as it sometimes seems with this Government, there is so little action.

Beyond all that, there is the wider issue of the complexity of local governance and the mix of authorities with responsibility for the project. Highways England is responsible for national roads and motorways, the Conservative-run Cambridgeshire County Council is responsible for local roads, and the Conservative Mayor and combined authority have strategic transport powers. My sense is that those at the combined authority do not think it has anything to do with them, and the county council does not have the resources necessary to give the project the attention it deserves.

Even more dispiriting is Highways England’s continuing failure to communicate properly. BBC Radio Cambridgeshire, in particular Dotty McLeod on the breakfast show, has kept residents informed and tried to explain what is happening, but Highways England consistently refuses to appear on the programme to respond. I pay tribute to journalists such as Jozef Hall and his colleagues for trying to pursue Highways England, but we have a problem when we have to resort to BBC journalists driving out in the middle of the night to find out what is going on because those responsible are refusing to answer questions.

The Minister will doubtless say that Highways England is an independent agency. Well, I say it was this Government who created that independence, and they did not absolve themselves of responsibility by so doing. It is public money, and there should be public accountability. I hope we can have an assurance from the Minister that, in future, Highways England will make itself available to answer questions on local media, just as local politicians have to.

My conclusion is that these problems could be resolved if there were the will and the resource to do it. I ask the Minister to intervene to end the misery. The suffering of the past few months cannot be undone, but it does not have to be extended. This project is in itself expensive, and, as I have said, it is more expensive now than it would have been if it had been completed years earlier, but for a fraction of the overall amount being spent the harm being done to my constituents could be mitigated. Signage, monitoring, TTOs, policing and proper governance are all key, and they should have been priorities from the start, but resourcing has made it all much more of a struggle.

I would like the Minister to commit now to properly resourcing a framework that means HGVs will follow the proper diversions. Drivers who do not, should be named, shamed and fined to protect the people of Cambridge who are currently left unprotected. I have been in conversation with Highways England for months, and it does not seem able to solve this problem. I have written to thousands of constituents to explain the situation and to ask for their views and experiences.

It is fundamentally unfair that our city’s roads will suffer damage and, more importantly, that the physical and mental health of my constituents will be affected owing to the Government’s neglecting to create the frameworks necessary to make sure that people follow the rules. I trust that the Minister will commit to sorting this out and that lessons will be learned from this sorry saga so that similar mistakes are not made on other schemes in the future.

Concessionary Bus Passes

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Tuesday 8th May 2018 Westminster Hall

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered concessionary bus passes.

It is a pleasure to serve when you are in the Chair, Ms Ryan. During my three years in Parliament, it has been noticeable that although most of our fellow citizens use buses, we rarely get to discuss bus issues in the House. I am delighted to see in the Chamber my good and hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood), Chair of the Select Committee on Transport, who I am sure will be putting that right in the coming months and years. Today, I shall focus mainly on the concessionary fares scheme and highlight its value and how it could be extended, but I shall also make a few observations about the problems that arise when running such a scheme in parts of the country with unregulated bus systems, and draw out possible solutions.

The national concessionary fares scheme has been a huge success. It has really changed the way older people live their lives, by increasing their freedom and, in many cases, reducing loneliness and isolation. As I think hon. Members will be aware, the bus pass in England provides free bus travel for older and disabled people during off-peak times—from 9.30 am onwards. Ironically, should anyone have chosen to use their concessionary fares pass to get here this morning, they would have been late. I can see that some of my colleagues set out much earlier—not that I am suggesting they would qualify for a bus pass. I am very pleased that so many people have made such an effort to be here at what is quite an early hour for Parliament on its return from recess.

The age of eligibility for the concessionary fares scheme has become slightly flexible. If the eligible age had remained what it was when the scheme was first announced, I might almost have qualified by now, but it seems to be slipping into the distance; I hope one day to catch it up. I think it is now 66. I hope that, in the future, many more people will be able to benefit from the scheme.

The trigger for calling this debate was the 10-year anniversary of the scheme. I congratulate the National Pensioners Convention, which made a big effort to celebrate it, including by sending birthday cards to Downing Street; I joined members to go and hand those in. I have to say that I was hoping there might be slightly more enthusiasm from the Government for celebrating the anniversary. We did have a discussion at Transport questions, and the Minister, I am delighted to say, had removed the threat of ongoing review, but I was hoping for something slightly more celebratory—a bit more Jürgen Klopp, a bit more dancing up and down, celebrating the success of the bus scheme.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate. He is a very long-standing supporter of buses. Will he also congratulate the TUC Midlands pensioners’ network? Its members marked the 10th anniversary of the concessionary bus pass by touring the midlands using their passes. My hon. Friend will not be surprised to hear that, when they came to Nottingham and we were talking to residents in Market Square, the overwhelming number of people did not avoid us; they came and spoke to us, and they expressed their great joy and made celebratory remarks about the bus pass for older people and disabled people, because they know what a lifeline it has been for so many people. Does my hon. Friend agree?

[Daniel Zeichner]

I thank my hon. Friend for that intervention. She is very prescient, because the TUC campaign was in the next paragraph of my speech; she has pre-empted it. She is right. Those of us who have done market square campaigning will know that we are not always a magnet for people to come and join us and enthuse, but I find that whenever we speak to older people, they are enthusiastic. I echo my hon. Friend’s congratulations to not only the east midlands TUC but Richard Worrall, who, when the scheme was initiated, set off on a tour of the country and was able to demonstrate that, using his bus pass, he could get round the whole country, which was very exciting. I am told that he is going to do that again, and certainly if he comes through Cambridgeshire I shall be very pleased to join him, although I shall be paying the extortionate fares that we suffer in rural Cambridgeshire—should we be lucky enough to find a bus. I say that because the enthusiasm to which I have referred is tempered by the fact that, in far too many areas, the Government seem to be managing decline rather than celebrating new routes. I will say a little about how that might be addressed, but first I would like to go back to the history of this scheme.

As I look around the Chamber, I see that some of us are old enough to remember that in the ’80s and ’90s pensioner campaigning was central to everything we did. I remember that, as a parliamentary candidate, I was summoned to many vibrant meetings—the pensioners’ organisations had a long list of demands at the time. That was because they compared, strangely enough, our situation in the UK with that in many other European countries and found that our European neighbours often enjoyed a whole series of things that pensioners in our country did not. One success of the post-1997 Labour Government was that they addressed pensioner poverty. I am thinking of measures such as free eye tests, the winter fuel payment and so on, and the bus pass was of course a key part of that.

However, there was not a particularly smooth path to that. We started with quite a panoply of schemes. Some places, such as London, had long had better schemes. Some of the urban areas—I have to say that they were almost always Labour-run areas—had been much more generous in the past. However, in the shires, it was much more of a battle. A kind of halfway house was introduced back in the Transport Act 2000, which gave pensioners half-price fares. That led to quite a lot of even more vexed campaigning.

I remember going to a Labour policy forum in 2004 with colleagues from adjoining counties in the rural east of England—I particularly remember the then leader of Norfolk County Council, Celia Cameron, and Bryony Rudkin from Suffolk. We sat with the then Secretary of State for Transport, Alistair Darling—this was long before he realised he was to become Chancellor of the Exchequer—and explained to him why we thought that a concessionary fares scheme of this type would be not only equitable and fair but hugely popular. I remember the look on Alistair’s face: he said, “Do you know how much that would cost?” That was actually quite a good question because, as I shall explain in a minute, the question of costs has never been properly tied down. His point, of course, was that it would be quite a costly commitment. We went away, having established the idea in principle, but with no great hope that it would necessarily be adopted, so it was with huge joy that we greeted the development a year later. I am not suggesting that it was just we who achieved this; it was a wide range of campaigners, but in the 2005 Labour manifesto a full scheme was suggested, and it was finally implemented in 2006.

The issue of funding is important because, right from the beginning, it has proved to be complicated and difficult. When I was a parliamentary candidate, I spent many a happy hour trying to work out, with my local county councillors and district councillors, who was paying for what and how much it was really costing, and, frankly, coming to the conclusion that probably no one was entirely sure.

We are told that, overall, this scheme now costs £1.17 billion per annum. Not surprisingly, the cost has increased since the scheme was introduced. We are told that, in 2013-14, 9.73 million concessionary travel passes were issued across the country; that puts the average cost at £120 per person. When the scheme was first introduced, the Government provided an extra £350 million for 2006-07 through the formula grant system to fund the cost to local authorities as they then saw it. Between 2008 and 2011, the Department for Transport provided a special grant, totalling just over £650 million, to local authorities to pay for the statutory concession.

Since 2011, however, it is the formula grant that funds the bus pass; money is no longer ring-fenced. Of course, it is a familiar sleight of hand by central Government to apparently put money into the local government grant and tell local government that it has to do this. As the years go by, it becomes less and less clear what the money is for. There is a strong suspicion that it is a sleight of hand, and particularly when councils are being so heavily squeezed, it is asking a lot of them.

Therefore, my first question to the Minister is whether she would like to have a word with the Treasury about looking again at providing proper, ring-fenced funding for the scheme to local authorities. It is not entirely clear to me that the current system of local government finance, particularly with the move away from central Government funding and, supposedly, to business rates retention, actually provides a good, sustainable model for supporting a scheme such as this.

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

Surely a proper cost-benefit analysis ought to be part of that assessment. In many rural areas, the benefit is that people in smaller, local towns can access services. Most significantly, the benefit is to the health budget, by keeping so many of our pensioners active and engaged. There are lots of studies now on the impact of loneliness on older people. This scheme helps to get people out and about, and maintains their health for much longer.

[Daniel Zeichner]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. I will come on to the social and environmental benefits in a minute. This partly shows us how complicated it is to assess the long-term benefits.

Returning to the relationship between central Government and local government, local authorities were charged with coming up with a reimbursement system that left the operator no better or worse off, but they are in a difficult place, and I will come on to the reimbursement system in a minute. The Local Government Association estimates the cost to local authorities at around £760 million a year, with a funding shortfall of £200 million. I suspect that that pressure will only get worse.

The operators are not keen on the system at all. I frequently hear complaints. It is difficult to prove what it costs to carry passengers for free, in a way that observes that reimbursement rule. Putting some extra people on half-empty buses does not necessarily cost more. If there are too many extra people, however, extra services are required.

I understand that the prime task of the bus operators—the big five and many smaller operators—is to return a profit to their shareholders. That is right and proper; that is what they do. They will inevitably claim that this costs rather a lot. In the early days—this was my experience in Cambridgeshire—the bus operators did quite well, because the reimbursement cost they extracted from the county council was rather high. Over time that seems to have settled. As has been said in questions to Ministers, the number of appeals has settled down, which suggests that there is a kind of settlement in all this. I think there is a wider question, however, of how and whether the reimbursement system works.

There is a comparison to be made between London, which has a regulated system, and the rest of the country. Thanks to the Bus Services Act 2017, we hope that some of the new mayoral authorities will adopt franchising. I hope my own in Cambridgeshire does. In London, where you have gross cost franchising, it is much simpler for Transport for London to make decisions about the public good. It decides the fares and the frequency, and then it pays the operator to deliver the service. In a way, the operator has much less to worry about, provided it does not drive up usage and extra costs too far. For London, which groups pay and which do not, and how much is made up by the fare box and how much is raised in others ways, are political choices.

In the rest of the country, it is much less clear. It could be suggested that operators have a perverse incentive to put up fares, because if they know that many of their passengers will be concessionary fare holders, they will be reimbursed for that. We will see whether that gets any response from the operators. The choice over discounts and whether young people should qualify for similar fare schemes is essentially market driven; it is not a choice around social need or the social good. There is a huge opportunity, if we shift to franchising, to move to a much clearer and more efficient model. It may reduce operators’ profits, but if it provides lower fares and space for social choices for the social good, it is worth them paying that price.

I pay tribute to the work being done by the Transport for Quality of Life team, including Lynn Sloman and Ian Taylor, who have begun to look at European systems where, effectively, transport is provided for free across an urban area—it is predominately urban areas at the moment. That is not a novel or unprecedented idea, because many people take the view that public transport—like health, education, policing, parks and museums—is an essential public service that contributes to the fabric of local life. The organisation’s work—often commissioned by my trade union, Unite—shows that this is already happening in 100 towns and cities worldwide, including more than 30 in the United States and 20 in France. Dunkirk, with a population of 200,000, will apparently become fare-free in September. The largest city in the world to have made its public transport free is Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, with a population of 440,000. Free transport was introduced to residents in 2013. It has cost the city €12 million, but it believes that that has been offset by a €14 million increase in municipal revenues, as many more people have moved there, increasing the tax base.

That links to some of the work being done by my colleagues on the Transport Committee about mobility as a service. We are looking at a whole new range of ways of getting around cities. My vision is what I see when I visit an airport. Some airports are like small cities. There are travellators, lifts, shuttle metros and shuttle buses. The noticeable thing is that we do not pay to get on each of them, because it is in the interests of that community to get people where they want to go quickly and efficiently. I argue that is in the interest of all of us, in all our cities and smaller towns, to ensure that people can get around quickly and efficiently.

That is my vision for the future, but to return to the present, extending franchising beyond the mayoralty areas would allow local authorities much more control over services in their areas. It would put them in a much stronger position to maintain stability in funding the national concessionary travel bus scheme. The additional flexibility could also be extended to the community transport sector. That is sometimes a controversial issue, but it is being raised by people in the sector. If we are looking for a flexible mix of transport solutions, particularly in rural areas, I think it should be considered.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Warley (John Spellar) has already raised the social issues involved. Very good work has been done on that by Claire Haigh at Greener Journeys. She demonstrated, in research done a few years ago, that each pound spent on a bus pass generates at least £2.87 in benefits to bus pass users and the wider economy.

[Lilian Greenwood]

Like my hon. Friend, I am very familiar with “Bus2020: The Case for the Bus Pass”, produced by Greener Journeys. I noted that in responding to the Government’s decision to confirm the bus pass, Claire Haigh produced an updated figure. Greener Journeys’ research has now shown that every pound spent on a bus pass delivers at least £3.79 in wider benefits for society. That updates the case made in 2014, when Greener Journeys first published that research.

[Daniel Zeichner]

That shows why my hon. Friend is Chair of the Transport Committee—I should keep up. That is an even bigger benefit. I know it is always difficult for Government when such figures are put forward, but in straitened times, understanding the wider cost-benefits is one of the challenges. How many of us have sat on councils where we have talked about trying to pool budgets and make things work more efficiently? It is a challenge, but one worth pursuing.

As we have heard, there are also savings for social services. The social benefit is intangible, but some interesting recent research by Transport Focus has shown that the social benefit of the bus—people talking to one another as opposed to taking separate taxi journeys—has a real value. We must not underestimate these social benefits. The bus absolutely contributes to the wider social good.

[Lilian Greenwood]

My hon. Friend is being generous with his time. Does he agree that the value of the bus is not only in its social benefits, but in the opportunities for the Government to realise some of their other policy goals, such as tackling poor air quality and congestion in our cities? Does he share my concern that the Government’s figures on congestion and traffic rises indicate that by 2040 there will be a 55% rise in traffic and an 86% rise in congestion? That is why it is in all our interests for the Government to adequately support bus travel.

[Daniel Zeichner]

Once again, my hon. Friend is absolutely right. The environmental benefits are really important. I was pleased to see the Minister announce at the UK bus summit the retrofitting proposals, which I was happy to see in the Labour party manifesto last year. It is always good to see the Government adopt such things, and I will have some more suggestions for the Minister in a minute. Alongside that proposal are the very good hydrogen buses that are being developed. I suspect that other Members, like me, have been happy to go and see them. All those things add to my point that the bus is one of the important ways forward in improving the quality of life in our cities, towns and villages.

One extremely good way of promoting buses is by looking at the younger generation, who we are reading about this morning.

[John Spellar]

Just before my hon. Friend moves on, I want to make a point that may lead on to the next part of his speech. Does he share my concern about the Resolution Foundation’s report today that calls for increased taxes and charges on pensioners? It once again raises the concern that many pensioners have that their use of or access to bus passes will be rationed or restricted. I hope he would say that that certainly should not happen, and perhaps give the Minister an opportunity to make it clear on behalf of the Government that they will definitely not be taking any action to change the availability of bus passes for pensioners.

[Daniel Zeichner]

My right hon. Friend is an experienced and skilled operator, and I am sure the Minister will have heard his challenge, which echoed the challenge I laid down at Transport questions the other day. Older generations may have done better—as I indicated, only 20 years ago pensioner poverty was a very real and terrible thing, and because of policy changes it is only recently that people have been less likely to be poor when they are older—but we have to get the balance between generations right. We do not do that by punishing another generation; we do that by finding the resources from other places.

Turning to younger people, who now need to benefit, I want to reiterate something about the scheme in general. Claire Walters, the chief executive of Bus Users UK, recently said:

“Far more people rely on bus services than trains in this country. They are as vital to many people’s lives as gas, electricity and water”.

For many young people, particularly those in rural counties such as mine, getting to college or work is a real challenge. We are not talking about home-school transport today, but the Government would do well to consider that at some point, because there are rumblings in the shires, as they may have noticed last Thursday. Part of the challenge for young people is the cost of travel, including home-school transport.

As my right hon. Friend has just mentioned, the Resolution Foundation report showed the immense squeeze on the younger generation. They have experienced the tightest squeeze on household spending we have known since 2000, and they now consume 15% less than older working-age people on items other than housing. As we know all too well, home ownership is now out of sight for many people who are working, particularly in cities like mine. At the other end of the spectrum, those under 25 face significant restrictions on the amount of benefits they can claim.

I was absolutely delighted by the announcement by Front-Bench hon. Friends a few weeks ago that in future Labour would provide free bus travel in some parts of the country to those under 25. That would reduce the barriers to accessing work and education that so many young people face. The proposal could benefit up to 13 million young people, helping them save up to £1,000 a year. My hon. Friends have suggested that money ring-fenced from vehicle excise duty could be used. In addition to my earlier argument about franchising, with much greater control from local authorities there could well be extra headroom within local funds to help fund such an extension of the scheme.

I can anticipate the reaction from the bus operators. My local Stagecoach bus manager, with whom I have had many detailed conversations about bus franchising over the years, is not shy in coming forward to warn me of the perils of such an approach. I say gently to the operators that while their books remain closed and their finances opaque, it is not unreasonable for those of us interested in the wider public good to wonder whether more savings could not be made. We are told it is an unregulated market, but it is a funny kind of free market when public money accounts for more than 40% of bus operator revenues through local authority contracts, the bus service operators grant, reimbursement for trips made under the concessionary passholders scheme and grants. We therefore have a responsibility to ask whether we are making best use of that public money.

There is a lot of public money going into the bus system. Can we make it work better? I welcome the announcement that the concessionary fare scheme is no longer under review, but as I intimated earlier, I would like a slightly warmer endorsement of the underlying principles and a true enthusiasm for universally available mass public transport systems. Let’s hear it for the bus! Where older people have led the way, let us open the door for young people too. As we do not know when the next general election is coming—it could be a little while yet—will the Minister consider meeting me and the shadow Minister responsible for buses to discuss adopting yet another of Labour’s excellent bus policies? Young people would be as happy with their new bus pass as millions of older citizens have been with theirs over the last decade.

--- Later in debate ---

[Daniel Zeichner]

I thank all hon. Members for the positive and constructive tone of the debate. I commend the Minister for her enthusiasm for the national concessionary fares scheme, which I hope will take it out of the political arena in future. For many older people, it has been a cause for concern but, if I understand what she is saying, we no longer need to have any concern about it.

A couple of points came out of the debate, such as universalism and means testing, as raised by the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon). It is fair to say that that debate ran through the Labour Government years. I think it has shifted in favour of universalism, and I hope it continues to, for all the reasons that hon. Members mentioned, such as bringing society together. There is an old adage that services for the poor produce poor services, but if they are universal services, they will be better services. That case has been particularly well made in terms of transport.

In the wise words of the Chair of the Transport Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham South (Lilian Greenwood), the concern is the declining availability of buses in too many areas. Having a bus pass without a bus is no use to anybody. In some of my wider reflections about how we could make better use of the public money that is spent, I was trying to suggest how to reverse what has seemed to many of us to be a sad decline. We all want my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (John Grogan) to enjoy the view from the front of his bus, but I suspect that if many more young people were on that bus, whether they were sitting at the front or the back, there would be more chance of having it. I commend Labour’s policies to the Minister and I suspect, over time, that we may well see progress.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered concessionary bus passes.

Business of the House

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Thursday 11th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Paul Maynard]

As I said earlier, the hon. Gentleman will not be surprised to know that, as someone from Cheshire, I understand the importance of Vauxhall Motors to the Ellesmere Port community. I was as disappointed as I am sure he was to hear about the further job losses. The rapid response service of Jobcentre Plus has already been put into action, and the Government are trying to engage with Vauxhall further throughout the process to do all we can both to protect UK jobs and to help those who are affected. There will be much more help available to those who are affected, but I recognise his concerns and will make sure that the Leader of the House passes them on to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

You may be aware, Mr Speaker, of the concern that many parents have about skin gambling and loot boxes and worries in the video gaming sector about unauthorised third party website selling those items from those loot boxes, thus potentially turning young people into gamblers. There have been reports of young people losing a great deal of money very quickly. May we have a debate in Government time on how best to protect our young people and also safeguard our very successful and vibrant video game industry?

[Paul Maynard]

The hon. Gentleman has raised an important example of how internet development and technologies can change rapidly and create new threats and dangers for which we need to ensure that we are fully prepared. He raises an important point. It sounds like a perfect vehicle for an Adjournment debate or a Westminster Hall debate, which will then make sure that the Minister’s attention is drawn to the matter more fully.

Exiting the EU: Costs

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Wednesday 29th November 2017 Commons Chamber

[Elizabeth Truss]

I assure my hon. Friend that that consideration is part of our discussions.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

Before making a big decision, it is generally sensible to inquire about the price. Most people will be staggered to learn that the average household in this country will be asked to stump up between £2,000 and £3,000 to pay for this. What plans do the Government have to tell people about the bill they are facing and to ask them whether they think it is a good use of their money?

[Elizabeth Truss]

The hon. Gentleman needs to look at both sides of the account, because we will not be paying ongoing vast sums into the EU as we are at the moment. He needs to look at the big picture.

Outsourcing and Tax Credits

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Friday 4th November 2016 Commons Chamber

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Last but certainly not least, Daniel Zeichner.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

I think we have got the message that the Minister wants lessons to be learned. Will he assure us that all that the minutes, recordings and transcripts relating to the process that led up to the tendering of the contract will be published?

[Simon Kirby]

I understand that the independent National Audit Office will be looking at all those and will report in due course—let us hope that it does so sooner rather than later—and we will learn lessons from that independent report.

The Economy and Work

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Thursday 26th May 2016 Commons Chamber

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

My part of the country is an area that is rightly perceived to be successful. Cambridge is, in many ways, a model for the future of Britain, with many innovative, high-tech, high-skill jobs linked to world-class research embedded in excellent local institutions. Public and private are mutually interdependent, and not seen as being at odds.

Last year, as part of the city deal process, the local business-led organisation Cambridge Ahead worked with all the local partners, at the Government’s request, and developed “The Case for Cambridge”, which was a powerful, evidence-based argument for what was needed to maintain that success. We should be implementing that case but, instead, we have lost almost a year on an extraordinary and bungled attempt to shoehorn three counties together into a devolution deal with an elected mayor. A few weeks ago, following an over-subscribed Westminster Hall debate on the East Anglia devolution deal, I suggested that the House have a more substantial discussion not only on the East Anglia deal but on the wider issues, because what is happening across England—this bungled mix of devolution and local government reorganisation, or lack of it—has profound consequences.

At this time of all times, with the parallel debate on the relationship between Westminster and Brussels, what an opportunity this was to have had a proper consideration of how each level of government could work with another, based on mutual respect. Instead, we have had a debate on Europe that has been intellectually largely bankrupt and a devolution process that in the east was reduced to, “You’ve got three weeks to make up your mind”, and “Oh, you’ve got to have an elected mayor or two”.

What is really needed and what the business community in particular is crying out for is the imagination, the freedom and the flexibility to unlock the massive potential that exists in and around Cambridge. Unfortunately, our strengths are also our weaknesses, and we struggle on housing and transport. There are so many possibilities, including the proposals put forward by the London-Stansted-Cambridge Consortium, which would unlock growth between Cambridge and London if only we could take advantage of such opportunities.

There are other threats to Cambridge’s knowledge economy. Having already trebled tuition fees for university students and scrapped maintenance grants, the Government now want fees to rise again. Few students will welcome paying more when so many feel that their contribution is already too high. When they make comparisons with other countries, they are right to feel aggrieved. We are all pleased that the Government have promised to protect the dual funding system of research, but there are real risks that such separation will be eroded over time.

Let me conclude by making the wider point that whatever the strength of a research-based, high-tech economy, we still need to make sure that the benefits are shared fairly. When I look at the rising number of people turning to the Cambridge food bank, see more and more people on short-term and zero-hours contracts and see the visible evidence of more and more rough sleepers on the streets of Cambridge, it is clear the economy is working for some but by no means all. One looks in vain for measures that will address that very real unfairness, while the measures on housing and benefit changes passed in the last Session will make the situation in my city worse, not better. Those are all reasons why I will oppose the Government tonight.

Budget Resolutions and Economic Situation

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd March 2016 Commons Chamber

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

It was striking how little the Chancellor had to say about science and innovation in the Budget. Nearly 60,000 people are employed in the Cambridge cluster, and Cambridge is home to over 1,500 tech companies with a combined annual revenue of about £13 billion. This Government’s record on science is erratic. Investment in research and development is only at 0.49% of GDP—below the OECD average of 0.67% and well below the EU target of 3%. That means that the UK comes last in the EU 27 and eighth in the G8 in terms of R and D spending as a proportion of GDP. The annual funding shortfalls resulting from the 2010 flat-cash settlement for the resource science budget meant a £1 billion loss to the UK research base over the lifetime of the previous Parliament.

There was some relief when the Government committed to protecting the science resource budget in real terms over the course of this Parliament, but £1.5 billion of this funding has been reserved for a new global challenges fund—a new funding commitment tucked within existing science resource funding. I would welcome clarification of how this will impact on current scientific research. It should be noted that funding for innovation and wider research sits outside the ring-fenced science budget. This funding supports companies, especially small and medium-sized enterprises, in translating their research into products.

Like many others, I was very disappointed by the Government’s decision to bin research grants for companies and replace them with loans. This will have a significant impact on key early-stage enterprises, which have explained that they will struggle to secure investment if they have a hefty loan on the books. Sadly, the Government did not listen. They should, because, as I have said on previous occasions, Cambridge’s future success is not assured. Last week, new data from the Office for National Statistics showed that house prices in Cambridge have risen faster since 2010 than anywhere else in the country. If people cannot live in the city, they are then forced to live outside, and that is why local transport matters so much.

I turn to the devolution deal—so-called. Let us be clear: Cambridge and the area around us need the freedoms to make the investments needed to tackle the housing and transport challenges we face. That was why Cambridgeshire councils, business and universities came together to create the Case for Cambridge—a thoughtful and sensible set of proposals put to Government last year. However, instead of responding positively to that locally agreed and developed proposal, the Government came back very late in the day with a completely different solution, and basically said, “You’ve got three weeks to take it or leave it.” Unsurprisingly, the reaction has been furious. The local enterprise partnership has rejected it, individual business leaders have rejected it, the city council has rejected it, and today Cambridgeshire County Council rejected it. This is no way to deal with the huge and urgent challenge that faces one of the most successful parts of the country: it puts that very success at risk. I hope that those involved in this process—ultimately it is Treasury-led—will reflect on what has happened and reopen discussions in good faith with Cambridgeshire. Cambridgeshire needs a deal, but it needs a deal for Cambridgeshire, not for the Treasury.

Oral Answers to Questions

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Wednesday 9th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Osborne]

First, everyone here would pay tribute to the people of Carlisle, the extraordinary resilience they have shown and the acts of friendship that neighbours have shown to those affected by the terrible floods. Before the Prime Minister left for central Europe this morning, he asked me to make sure we would be able to help on the specific point my hon. Friend raises, and did raise with the Prime Minister, and I can say that we will support the work the Cumbria Community Foundation does and we will match, by up to £1 million, the money it is raising for its local flood appeal.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

Q9. When the Chancellor tripled student tuition fees, he set the repayment threshold at £21,000. He has now frozen the threshold, and the Institute for Fiscal Studies tells us that many students will bear many extra thousands of pounds in repayments. Given that he has broken his promise, will he send students an apology or just the bill?

[Mr Osborne]

There seems to be collective amnesia among Labour Members: they introduced tuition fees and the payment threshold was £15,000. We have increased it to £21,000, which enables us to fund the lifting of the cap and more people who are qualified to go to university. I would have thought, and I would have hoped, that on this day the hon. Gentleman welcomed the big investment we are making in Cambridge, not least with the renovation of the famous Cavendish laboratory.

Finance Bill (First sitting)

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Thursday 17th September 2015 Public Bill Committees

[Barbara Keeley]

Indeed. I think one of my hon. Friends wanted to intervene.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Roger. I quite take the point you just made, but does my hon. Friend agree that it is slightly rich for Government Members to talk about the past when they were elected last time on a pledge to reduce the deficit by half by the end of the Parliament, which they have completely failed to achieve? Setting tax rates in stone will only further perpetuate their past failure.

[Barbara Keeley]

Absolutely. In talking more broadly, I have been trying to paint a picture of the impact of the set of policies in the Budget, not all of which are in the Bill.

We feel that the tax lock is a short-term measure. As I said earlier, we need to think about long-term reform to ensure an equitable and efficient tax system that provides good value for the taxpayer. There is also a need for long-term tax system planning. We welcome the consultations announced by the Government, but action is also needed on, for example, the alignment of national insurance contributions and income tax. That has been discussed many times, over and over again, but never acted upon, and I will be talking about that later in the debate.

Finance Bill (Second sitting)

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Thursday 17th September 2015 Public Bill Committees

[Mr Gauke]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for her contribution. She makes a very good point.

The hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South asked what would happen if inflation is higher than the increase in the national minimum wage. The Government’s aim is to have a national minimum wage that helps as many low-paid workers as possible without damaging their employment prospects. We welcome the fact that the Low Pay Commission shares our aim of seeing progressive real increases in the national minimum wage. It is because we have a strong economy and high levels of employment that we are seeing increases in the national minimum wage and that we now have the flexibility to introduce a national living wage.

On those who do not benefit from the increase in the personal allowance, we believe that in our income tax system someone working 30 hours a week on the national minimum wage should not pay income tax. These changes will ensure that those individuals will be taken out of income tax. We want to create incentives to encourage those who, for example, wish to increase their hours if their circumstances permit them to do so. They should be able to do that without finding themselves paying income tax.

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Howarth. Will the Minister tell me how much a part-time worker earning, say, £8,000 will benefit from the changes?

[Mr Gauke]

The point I am making is that as we increase the personal allowance, people who earn under that amount do not pay income tax. If we still had a personal allowance of £6,475, such a person would clearly be paying income tax. If the hon. Gentleman is saying that we have already made an awful lot of progress, I would entirely agree with him. That does not mean that we should stop.

The hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South raised the issue of the national living wage, which we will introduce. It is based on the national minimum wage, which we believe should continue in its current form, applying recommendations from the Low Pay Commission to the Government. That has an important role to play.

The Government want to protect younger workers’ employment prospects as well as see as many people as possible benefiting from a higher wage. Given that younger workers tend to have less experience in the labour market than older workers, there is a risk that too high a wage rate might make them relatively less attractive to employers. That is why we will have both the national living wage and the national minimum wage.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Gauke]

There is a question of cost. It is necessary to evaluate where the impact would lie and the benefit of going above £200,000. Yes, the allowance was once at a very high level, but that was because of particular temporary circumstances, given the uncertainty that existed towards the end of the previous Parliament.

Let us not forget that 99% of companies will receive 100% relief on their investment with an annual investment allowance of £200,000. It is a question of balancing the benefit to investment with the cost in tax that we will forgo if we go above £200,000. The judgment that we made was that, given that 99% of companies will get 100% relief, a level of £200,000 was a reasonable approach to take in the context of a set of policies that are undoubtedly pro-business and designed to attract investment in the UK.

[Daniel Zeichner]

rose—

[Roger Mullin (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (SNP)]

rose—

[Mr Gauke]

I was about to conclude, but I will quickly take the two inventions.

[Daniel Zeichner]

On a point of clarity, given that we are discussing permanence, I think I heard the Minister say that this would be the level for the remainder of the Parliament. Is that what he is saying?

[Mr Gauke]

That is our intention, yes; £200,000 will be the level for this Parliament.

--- Later in debate ---

[Barbara Keeley]

I will come on to a very good reason why. I will answer the hon. Gentleman’s points. I ask the Minister why—I hope he does not lose this question—given the average house price outside London, the Chancellor has decided to introduce this additional band. There are wider questions, which I said I would come to, about the scope of who will benefit from the nil rate band.

The new tax exemption applies to lineal descendants. We welcome the clarification of who will benefit outlined in the Government amendment, and the apparent extension of the nil rate band to a lineal descendant’s spouse or civil partner in the event of the lineal descendant’s death. However, the Institute of Chartered Accountants has pointed out that it could be seen as discriminatory to allow the relief only to lineal descendants; many godparents, aunts and uncles are as close to, and their lives are as intertwined with those of, godchildren, nieces and nephews as are those children’s parents. That is the kind of family structure that we have these days.

[Daniel Zeichner]

I agree with my hon. Friend. I have had representations from constituents who feel that the lineal descendancy clause is absolutely discriminatory, particularly against childless couples. There seems to be no logic to it, and I would welcome hearing the Minister’s case for it.

[Barbara Keeley]

My hon. Friend puts that in an excellent way. Will the Minister clarify the Government’s position on why the policy will apply only to lineal descendants? It has the potential to raise house prices by making property an even more attractive investment for the wealthiest, which would make it even more difficult for ordinary working people to get on to the property ladder.

Paul Johnson, the director of the IFS, has said that it is

“rather odd to give this special treatment to housing given that owner-occupied housing is already extremely tax privileged”.

He said:

“This will only increase the bias we have towards putting your money in a house, to inflating potentially the value of housing, without dealing with the lack of housing, which is driving up the value of private residences.”

Many of the policy’s features are similar to those analysed in a Treasury document that was leaked to, and published by, The Guardian. According to the estimates in the document, based on Budget 2014 forecasts, the policy would reduce the proportion of estates liable for inheritance tax from 8% in 2015-16 to just over 6% by the end of the Parliament, rather than increasing it to slightly more than 10%, as the current policy would have done. The document contains the argument that

“there are not strong economic arguments for introducing an inheritance tax exemption specifically related to main residences”.

A number of problems with the policy are set out in the document, such as the fact that it would encourage investment in owner-occupied housing rather than other more productive investments and that it would discourage downsizing late in life when that might otherwise be appropriate. Although the Government have made some provisions to prevent the downsizing problem, industry experts have said that the changes could lead to more people choosing to upsize later in life, which would have consequences for the availability of housing stock for other buyers.

I want to talk about the balance of the Government’s tax cuts, including changes to inheritance tax. Those changes will cost £24.6 billion over the Parliament, and they will be financed by five main sources, according to the Office for Budget Responsibility. Tax increases will raise £47.2 billion over the Parliament; we have talked about things such as insurance premium tax. Welfare cuts, including cuts to tax credit and many freezes, will raise nearly £35 billion. Other spending decisions will cut £8.1 billion. Cuts to departmental spending and to the BBC have been proposed. Various tax and spending decisions have indirect effects that will raise a further £14.2 billion.

The Budget decisions, interestingly, imply £3.5 billion of extra borrowing over the Parliament, on top of the £14.6 billion increase indicated by the OBR pre-measures forecast. Inheritance tax raised an estimated £3.8 billion in 2014-15, but house price inflation had been expected to drive the tax take up to £6.4 billion by 2019-20. Instead of the Exchequer receiving more revenue from inheritance tax, however, the policy is expected to cost it £940 million a year by 2020-21, when the additional family home allowance—like the existing allowance, it will be transferable between spouses—reaches £175,000 per person.

When they talk about borrowing, Conservative Members should bear in mind that if the Government had kept the existing allowance, they would have more than halved expected additional borrowing over the lifetime of the Parliament. In contrast, their position appears to mean more borrowing, when one of the Government’s specified aims is to do the opposite. It seems strange that in the debates we have had so far the Conservative party seems to be convinced that it is okay to increase taxes such as insurance premium tax and to make increases that hit very large numbers of people the main way to raise finances, while implementing changes to inheritance tax that will cost the Exchequer considerable sums of money.

Surely, keeping inheritance tax as it was would be better than increasing the insurance premium tax and making hefty welfare cuts. Those are the decisions that are weighed against each other. The Government are cutting a tax for the wealthier families in the country, while cutting tax credits for millions of those who are in need. That is what we are going to see over the coming years. We could say that this is a rather warped interpretation of Robin Hood: taking money from the poorest to pay for a tax cut for the richest.

To answer the point made by the hon. Member for North Dorset, this tax cut comes at the same time as the Government have decided to abandon a manifesto pledge to implement a £72,000 cap on care costs. In a written statement to the House of Lords on 25 July 2015, the cap on costs was described as an expensive new commitment. The cap—a pledge made by the Conservative party—was designed to prevent older people and younger people with disabilities from having to sell their homes when they went into care.

Here is the answer for the hon. Gentleman: why is it okay for people with care needs to have to sell their homes and have nothing to pass on, while the very wealthiest—the top 10%—are allowed to keep house values of £1 million? The Government have decided to abandon a cap, for which they had made legislation, on the grounds that it is too expensive, while they are opting to go with the introduction of the nil rate band for inheritance tax on properties, which will cost £1 billion by 2020. That £1 billion a year could have been an incredible investment in social care; instead, we are going the opposite way. We are talking about hundreds of thousands of pounds, if not millions. People who have to pay their own care costs will be under a huge burden and will have to give up their homes.