Cycling

Debate between Lord Austin of Dudley and Caroline Lucas

Thursday 16th October 2014 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Lucas (Brighton, Pavilion) (Green)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing the debate. He has spoken about safety and about funding. Does he agree that we need funding for revenue as well as capital? We need money to go to cycle groups and local councils so that they can invest in safety as well as in cycle lanes.

[Ian Austin]

The hon. Lady is right, and I shall discuss that point at some length in a few minutes.

Promoting cycling would be good for our transport systems as a whole, for local economies, for social inclusion, and for public health. People who think that investing in cycling is somehow anti-motorist, or against the car, should ask themselves why the AA has joined the campaign to boost cycling. It has done so because cycling is an obvious way of reducing congestion, which has been estimated to cost the UK economy £4.3 billion a year. Research from Denmark has shown that a nation makes a 13p profit for every kilometre cycled, but an 8p loss for every kilometre driven.

As I said earlier, this is our third debate on cycling in the last three years. The first was triggered by the campaign run by The Times. More than 70 Members took part in that debate; even more, well over 100, took part in the second. Sadly, I think that fewer will take part today. We asked for this debate so that we can discuss the Government’s response to the recommendations in our report. We had been promised that response for months, but the Government kept delaying its publication amid numerous reports of wrangles and disputes between the various Departments involved. Because it was not clear when it would be published, cycling organisations and the media were unable to promote the debate and encourage their members and supporters to lobby MPs to take part in it. It turns out that the document—1 do not think that it could be credibly described as a delivery plan—was published this morning. As a result, we have been left far too little time to subject it to proper scrutiny, although it is already clear that it is a very disappointing piece of work. We waited a year for this report, but it makes no real commitments at all.