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.
Lord Bradshaw
The Minister has several times referred to subsidy to bus operators in respect of things such as concessionary fares. That is a subsidy to the passenger; it is not a subsidy to the bus industry.
Earl Attlee
My Lords, I accept my noble friend’s point.
The Government believe in buses. The vision is for a better bus with more of the attributes passengers want: more punctual, interconnected services, an even greener and more fully wheelchair-accessible fleet and the wide availability of smart ticketing. A more attractive, more competitive, greener bus network will encourage more people on to buses, create growth and cut carbon.