Brexit: Road, Rail and Maritime Transport (EUC Report)
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts(5 years, 7 months ago)
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Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con) [V]
My Lords, I join the congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, and all members of the committee for this excellent report. Yes, time has marched on, but there seems to be little development that negates their excellent work and the contribution that they have made. I will ask the Minister a couple of questions for when she sums up. I very much associate myself with the comments of my noble friend Lord Bourne on roaming and mobile phone costs. I have pre-empted this personally by purchasing a SIM card that is valid in Denmark; in fact, I do not think that it is valid over here. That is my way of getting round the mobile phone charges that may come into effect.
I will refer briefly to work that relates more to road freight than to road passenger transport. The EU sub-committee on which I sit had cause to undertake an inquiry and look closely at the Irish border and the Northern Irish-Irish freight issue. I know that the noble Baroness, Lady Ritchie, is affected by it. It will have a huge impact on agri-foods. Equally, as we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, in presenting the findings of the report today, passenger transport—whether private or bus and coach—across the Irish border will be impacted if no deal is in place, so an update from the Minister on that would be particularly helpful.
On vehicle standards, paragraph 118 states:
“For vehicles to be registered, sold and enter into service, they must be type-approved by a recognised authority.”
Can the Minister assure us that we will be in a position where future arrangements will be covered by mutual recognition for type-approval? If that were not the case, it would obviously mean that two separate approvals would be required for vehicles entering the UK and the EU. That would have cost implications for manufacturers that would inevitably be passed on to consumers. I support the Government’s intention to seek mutual recognition for type-approvals for a mutually beneficial arrangement. As paragraph 118 says
“there is no exact precedent for such a regime”
so I hope that my noble friend will have good news on that.
I want to say a bit about cabotage and cross trade as it relates to lorries—road haulage—buses and sea. I was obviously privy to some of the negotiations as an MEP when the issues were negotiated, but they have had huge beneficial effects and an impact on the economy. Any loss of cabotage or cross trade benefits would be very difficult indeed.
I will also point to another advantage that I believe the European Parliament was at the forefront of, and that is the requirement that coaches must have seat belts fitted and that they must be worn. That was against the backdrop of a number of fatal accidents, often leading to children, but adults as well, being either fatally injured or suffering life-changing injuries. That was a very positive development that I hope we can have regard to.
My noble friend Lord Blencathra spoke glowingly about free ports. I am also very keen on free ports, but we have to be honest and bust this myth that we have had to leave the European Union to have free ports across Britain. Free ports exist across the European Union. Nothing in all the time we have been a member of the European Union has prevented us having free ports. We can park that one in whatever car park we will have after 1 January. Luxembourg, which does not have a coast, has free ports. Today’s good news is that we can already have free ports and we do not need to wait for 1 January to have that.
On cabotage, I am again very proud of the role the European Parliament has historically played in that regard. Paragraph 30 in the report’s recommendations says:
“Loss of cabotage rights would have negative implications for some UK operators.”
I hope my noble friend will be able to put a figure on that and give us some assurance that our operators will continue to enjoy cabotage rights at sea, on the roads and on the buses. As the report has highlighted, this has been so economically beneficial.
I welcome this opportunity. It is still very timely, because we are almost at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month. It is a very positive contribution to the debate, and I look forward very warmly to what my noble friend has to say in response to the queries raised.
Railways
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts(5 years, 7 months ago)
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Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
The department is looking at and analysing the routes that people take and the modes by which they take them, at all times. That includes looking at how we travel to key economic areas within the EU and elsewhere.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con) [V]
My Lords, given the experience of Covid, there will be an element of home-working on a permanent basis. Will my noble friend ensure that the Government will look at more flexible fares, ensuring that more of us travel on the railways? What is the current barrier to rolling out the Oyster card, so that it can be used across at least the whole of England?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
Flexible fares will be a feature of the landscape going forward, and the noble Baroness is quite right that some people have changed the way that they work. However, we saw some of that shift before the Covid pandemic actually struck. We are also looking in detail at pay-as-you-go ticketing and contactless travel, which is absolutely essential for those of us who live in London—we know the benefits of the Oyster card. It was a manifesto commitment to extend contactless travel to more than 200 stations in the south-east.
International Travel
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts(5 years, 7 months ago)
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Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
Our existing measures are operating effectively. I had the same experience as the noble Lord: I went through the Greek system twice over the summer, on two islands, and found it to be very different in both cases. I do not think there is any country we should hold up as a great way of doing things. However, we are very open to hearing about new approaches and evidence from other countries. As I said in answer to a previous question, Border Force does spot checks on people filling out the PLF and, as I said previously, 4,154 cases have been referred to the police.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con) [V]
My Lords, I welcome the two changes: introducing airline testing and extending the airline corridors to islands. Can my noble friend help me understand how the excellent work being done by the joint biosecurity centre can lead to three different results in three different nations of the UK? Also, is my noble friend as concerned as I am that the distance incoming passengers have to travel for subsequent tests, having had a test at the airport, could put passengers off? Will the Government address that, perhaps through a more mobile testing system? Is my noble friend aware that with imminent changes to airline schedules—the autumn and winter schedules come into effect at the end of this month—it is of the utmost importance to give longer than two or three days’ notice of any change to airline corridors?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)
The international travel corridors are not just airline corridors; they are corridors for all modes. As my noble friend will know, to cope with current demand, airlines have been changing their schedules far more frequently than previously, which was twice a year. I am aware that there are small issues occasionally with Test and Trace, and of course we are working on those and looking to improve them where problems arise. We must remember that the vast majority of people are able to get tested very quickly and get their result very quickly. My noble friend also mentioned the devolved Administrations. I believe I have gone as far as I can on that one—it is up to the devolved nations to decide. Any interpretation of data is always going to be subjective and they have reached a different decision from the UK Government as it applies to England. UK citizens in the devolved nations, and indeed in England, need to be aware and understand that these things can change.
Public Service Vehicles (Open Data) (England) Regulations 2020
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts(5 years, 10 months ago)
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Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con) [V]
My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend on introducing these regulations, which I warmly welcome in principle. My questions concern how they will work in practice—in particular, in rural areas. My information is that 51% of all bus journeys take place in London, where, as my noble friend said, you might have to wait between two and 20 minutes for a bus. In rural areas, you might have to wait two hours, which is unacceptable. Is one reason for the need for the regulations that currently fewer than 50% of the 87 local authorities in England provide real-time information for the bus system and there is no national database for fares information?
Will the Minister also respond to my concern that most passengers who use rural buses are on concessionary fares? Concessionary fares are most welcome but, when they were rolled out from a local/regional system to a national system, this left many local authorities, including North Yorkshire and others, cash-strapped as they had more people willing to use the service from outside than were contributing to it in the area.
The Transport Secretary is custodian of this digital service. Can the Minister explain the implications of that and where this service will be publicly available? Does one have to use the app? I agree with the noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, that Movia, in Copenhagen, works very well indeed and provides information on not just buses but train connections. If, for example, you are connecting through York to the outlying villages, it is extremely important to know if your train is delayed as that might impact on the time the bus leaves.
Although I welcome the emphasis on buses, I think it realistic to say that the Government’s announcement on e-scooters will not bring any benefits to North Yorkshire. What are the cost implications for bus operators? Will there be any implications for local authorities, which are extremely cash-strapped, with very few staffing or financial reserves at the moment? Can the Minister put my mind at rest that these regulations will work as well in rural areas, where buses are few and far between, as they are currently deemed to do in urban areas such as London?
Covid-19: Airline Sector
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts(5 years, 10 months ago)
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Baroness McIntosh of Pickering
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of COVID-19 on the airline sector; and what steps they are taking to support that sector.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Transport (Baroness Vere of Norbiton) (Con) [V]
My Lords, the Government recognise the challenging times facing the airline sector because of Covid-19. They have announced an unprecedented package of measures that the sector can draw upon, including a Bank of England scheme for firms to raise capital, time-to-pay flexibilities, and financial support for employees.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con) [V]
My Lords, given the parlous state of the airline industry and the fact that it is a major employer and driver of the economy and vital for delivering the project of global Britain, does my noble friend recognise that a further package of emergency measures, such as a 12-month waiver for air passenger duty and an extension of the furlough scheme for aviation, is vital to safeguard the sector’s future, to stimulate demand and to safeguard airline jobs?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton [V]
My noble friend is quite right that it is important that we give all necessary support to the aviation sector. She mentioned two possible things that could be done. On air passenger duty, that is paid by passengers, of whom there are of course very few at the moment, but to the extent to which an airline might have had previous liabilities, they have been allowed to delay paying that under the Government’s time-to-pay arrangements. On furlough, that scheme is already in place until October.
Civil Aviation (Insurance) (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts(5 years, 10 months ago)
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Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con) [V]
My Lords, I thank my noble friend for introducing this instrument and for giving us the opportunity to scrutinise it in some detail. Perhaps I may put a number of questions to her. In her introduction, my noble friend said that a key feature of the regulations is the transference of responsibility from the European Commission to the Department for Transport on exiting the European Union. Will there be regular reviews of this, as there were in 2018 and 2019, and now in 2020? Will my noble friend commit to a regular review of the cover under the regulation? Will parliamentary scrutiny of such a review be allowed?
My noble friend will be only too aware of the particular challenges that the current Covid-19 pandemic has presented to the whole of the civil aviation sector, in particular to airlines and airports. In just three short months, we have seen an unprecedented challenge being dumped on to them. Along with other noble Lords, in particular the noble Lords, Lord Foulkes and Lord Blunkett, I would like to ask my noble friend if she can confirm that the Covid-19 pandemic will be added to the categories that are specifically included in the provisions of this instrument.
I have another question in response to my noble friend’s invitation to comment on these regulations. Can she confirm that the refunds, which will come to a huge amount, to reimburse passengers for flights that have been cancelled—I must declare an interest in this regard—will also fall within the remit and the provisions of these regulations?
The greatest challenge to airlines is their cash-flow problem. Most of their funds are tied up in planes and the payment of staff. While we have seen a review of the furlough provisions, we have also had announcements about the very sad redundancies in most of the airlines that fly from the UK. There has been a double hit, in the sense that airlines are being asked to make substantial refunds at speed, but at the same time, surely no future bookings will be made until we know that they can operate as normal again. Will my noble friend take this opportunity to confirm that refunds for those cancelled flights will be covered by the statutory instrument before us?
I have two other brief questions. First, is my noble friend able to confirm the status of the vouchers being issued by most airlines in place of refunds? Will she also confirm that, while having the same validity, these vouchers are not as easily accessible as immediate refunds? Secondly, can she confirm that the provisions for checking in luggage, as part of the new ways in which airlines will operate, are advisory, or are they indeed mandatory?
Aviation and Tourism: Cancellations
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts(6 years ago)
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Baroness Vere of Norbiton
I thank the noble Lord for that suggestion and for bringing up the important issue of vouchers. Customers may be offered a voucher as opposed to a refund, but they are under no obligation to accept it. We are looking at all sensible proposals so that we can balance the protection of consumer rights, which is absolutely essential, with recognising the enormous impact this is having on an industry that employs hundreds of thousands of people and is a huge contributor to our economy.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
Does the Minister agree that one of the greatest problems facing the airline industry at the moment is cashflow? What support are the Government minded to lend to the airlines at this crucial time? What discussions are she and the department having with our international partners to enable flights to take off at some point this year, particularly regarding social distancing, which is important and very difficult to deliver on planes and at airports? What kit will passengers have to use and what will be done to enable our rules to be recognised by our international partners?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton
My noble friend raises an important series of questions. On voucher support, the Chancellor has already announced wide-ranging support for all sizes of businesses. I encourage all those in trouble in the travel sector to avail themselves of the opportunities that there are. On restart and recovery, which is very much on our minds as well, an aviation restart and recovery team has been set up specifically at the DfT to work with the aviation industry to understand all the challenges it will have to get our planes back in the skies and to make sure that people can once again travel.
Smart Motorways
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts(6 years, 1 month ago)
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Baroness Vere of Norbiton
The noble Baroness makes a number of interesting points. There are two things to consider here: actual safety and the perception of safety. On emergency refuge areas, we are doing all sorts of things to ensure that they are more visible. On new motorways, the standard will be that they are three-quarters of a mile apart. We are making sure that, where possible, they meet the 15-foot width standard. As for the perception of safety, the important thing is that drivers understand what a smart motorway is, how it can benefit them, how they should use it and, if they get into trouble, exactly what they need to do.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, will my noble friend the Minister take my thanks back to the Government following the debate to which she kindly responded recently? Will she accept that the smart technology is not up to speed for the smart motorways, and will the Government delay the continuation until the smart technology is in place?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton
I thank my noble friend for her warm words about the report and put on record my thanks to everybody in the department who worked on it. It was an enormous undertaking, involving a huge amount of data that had to be analysed. I am perhaps not entirely sure to what the noble Baroness is referring as all sorts of technology already exists on these motorways, be that the red “X” signs to prevent people travelling in certain lanes, the enforcement of those signs, or the MIDAS speed monitoring systems. All sorts of things are in place. She may have been referring to stopped vehicle detection, which we are rolling out more quickly than we originally anticipated; that will be in place within three years.
Flybe
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts(6 years, 2 months ago)
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Baroness Vere of Norbiton
On the issue of communications with employees, hearing it on the radio is less than ideal. I am sure it is not how any noble Lord would treat any of their employees. It is not acceptable and there are better ways of keeping employees up to date with what is going on. I cannot agree with the noble Lord that all is doom and gloom for employees and that everything must be improved. As I set out in the opening Statement, there are many routes that employees can now take. The Government stand ready to help, working alongside the unions, and the Insolvency Service is able to make payments.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
To pursue the question put by the noble Lord, Lord Foulkes, on routes and the fact that Virgin is a major shareholder of Flybe, what will happen to Flybe’s profitable routes? Can my noble friend assure the House that there will be a proper procedure to make sure that they are sold to the highest bidder, so to speak? I raised the question of PSOs in the earlier Statement: will she make sure that this is dealt with as a matter of urgency?
Baroness Vere of Norbiton
Aviation services are part of the market economy and we would expect the profitable routes to be taken up by other airlines. As I have mentioned, we have had proactive input from a number of airlines looking to service those routes. I can say no more about PSOs. The Government are looking at both the profitable routes and those that may need support, and at all possible options to get them up and running.
Smart Motorways
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering Excerpts(6 years, 2 months ago)
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Baroness McIntosh of Pickering
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the safety of smart motorways and what plans they have to review their policy towards them.
Baroness McIntosh of Pickering (Con)
My Lords, I welcome the opportunity to hold this debate. I start by recording my condolences for those who have lost loved ones or suffered serious injury in an incident on a smart motorway.
When smart motorways were first discussed, I sat on the RAC Foundation Public Policy Committee; I am currently a subscribing member of the RAC club. At that time, I expressed in the strongest possible terms real and grave concerns on safety grounds, as smart motorways clearly pose an immediate danger to the drivers and occupants of cars—particularly where they might break down on a hard shoulder that is being used as a running lane—as well as to other motorway users. While the existing road structure may have been deemed to lead to congestion, that a broken-down vehicle could clog up what was essentially used for emergency purposes as a hard shoulder was surely unconscionable.
The department appears to use a formula based on a points system to assess road safety elements. Points are allocated according to the number of casualties or fatalities caused by an unsafe road either to justify motorway improvements or the construction of a roundabout. If the formula of the points-based allocation is not met, nothing will happen. I know this to be the case with roundabouts from personal experience. Many people before me had campaigned for a roundabout to be built on the northern access to the town of Easingwold in the former constituency of the Vale of York. My predecessors had been very vocal in this regard. On election day 1997, three people were killed at the exact spot of the requested roundabout. As a result of that tragedy, the requisite number of casualties had been reached and points satisfied, and the roundabout was built.
I will leave the Minister, whom I am delighted to see in her place, to describe smart motorways and their purpose. Essentially, they rely on technology to make use of the hard shoulder. Initially, the pilot was cautious, opening up hard shoulders only at peak times, with emergency refuge areas closely spaced. Then in the early 2010s, plans emerged to turn motorway hard shoulders into permanent running lanes—managed motorways known as all-lane running. Later, they became smart motorways and the Highways Agency decided to space the emergency refuge areas further apart.
As I understand it, there are currently three types of smart motorway scheme: all-lane running, dynamic hard shoulder. and controlled motorways. The Highways Agency surely believed at the time that the design would be as safe as existing motorways, but it recognised the increasing risk of a vehicle breaking down in a live traffic lane. Highways England, as it became, estimates that congestion on motorway and major road networks in England costs £2 billion every year, yet it acknowledges that 25% of that congestion results from incidents on those motorways.
The safety record of smart motorways was not good and has deteriorated. Thirty-eight people died on smart motorways in the five years to January this year. On one section of the M25, the number of near-misses since the hard shoulder was removed in April 2014 increased from 72 in 2014 to almost 1,500 in 2019. That is staggering.
Clearly, every fatality represents a human tragedy and wasteful loss of life. I want to refer to just one: the case of a mother who was killed on the M6 elevated area. The driver pulled over, but the hard shoulder was in use as a dynamic lane where there was no emergency refuge area or exit for 2.5 miles. I would say that that death was preventable.
Cars which break down in a live lane leave occupants fearful whether they can safely exit the vehicle or whether they will be spotted if they remain in it. Highways Agency figures show that it takes on average 17 minutes to reach a vehicle in such circumstances.
A welcome pause came on 30 January this year when my right honourable friend the Secretary of State—I do not know whether he is still in position as we speak; the Minister indicates that he is, so I congratulate him—stated that the M20 and other stretches of road will not be opened as planned as smart motorways until the outcome of the government review is known. I hope that my noble friend the Minister will take this opportunity to speak as freely and openly as she can to let us know what the state of that review is.
I want to take a moment to consider the alternatives, of which there are essentially three. First, I know that many such as the AA would scrap smart motorways and hard-shoulder running lanes and revert to using hard shoulders as they were originally intended, allowing police, ambulance, fire and other emergency vehicles to access injured occupants as quickly as possible. The second option is to increase the number of existing emergency refuge areas so that, in the event of a breakdown, there is more chance of a vehicle reaching the emergency refuge area. Thirdly, we could widen existing carriageways or increase the number of lanes from three to four, albeit they may be narrower.
How will such improvements be paid for? While I recognise that hypothecation is not normally permitted, one or two motorways have been seen to benefit recently from hypothecated funding. I urge the Government to consider spending road tax revenues on improving road safety and investing in an alternative infrastructure to smart motorways, thereby making our roads safer.
I want to end with a number of questions for my noble friend the Minister. Does she agree with, and will she have regard to, the words of the national chair of the Police Federation of England and Wales, who has said that smart motorways are inherently dangerous, put lives at risk and are death-traps? No one should know better than the police and other emergency personnel how unsafe smart motorways have turned out to be.
Can the Minister put our minds at rest that cost savings have not been chosen over human life and road safety? Will the Government take this opportunity to reverse the priority and either return the hard shoulder to its original use or increase the width and number of lanes?
As asked in Local Transport Today, is it acceptable that a risk should have consciously been designed into smart motorways in order to deliver the benefits of increased road capacity? Surely the benefits of road capacity must be secondary to the fundamental safety of those using the motorways.
Smart motorways may have been considered as safe as traditional motorways, but that has been proved not to be the case. Even when they were initially piloted, it was known that they could have been safer. It is unacceptable that cost appears to have been chosen over road safety, and what a cost it has been. Now is the time to end the speculation, to end this catastrophic experiment and to put safety first.
Cost and saving money must not trump road safety.