Brexit: Customs Procedures

Lord Bradshaw Excerpts

Monday 15th January 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bates]

I can certainly give noble Lords that confidence. As one would expect, the Treasury and HMRC have had over 300 meetings with trade bodies and officials about preparedness. We have our own customs data service—the electronic response that we believe will be ready by January 2019 to take the strain. There is also potential for a back-up system alongside the existing chief system that is in operation. We believe that a lot of work has been done. There is a lot of work for the ports to do as well in terms of their own inventory systems. But as 99% of customs declarations are done electronically at present, there is a great opportunity for us to advance that part of the way we do business to ensure a frictionless way of transacting business going forward.

[Lord Bradshaw (LD)]

The logistics industry is one of the most efficient parts of our economy, mainly in road haulage but also in warehousing just-in-time distribution. Industry would be severely handicapped if supplies did not arrive at the factory gate or in the shops absolutely on time. Have the Government had detailed discussions with the Freight Transport Association, the Road Haulage Association and the ports authority to work out what would happen if things do not work as the Government hope they will?

[Lord Bates]

Those are exactly the types of conversation we are having. Noble Lords would expect us to have those conversations and we are having them. We have a cross-government border planning group planning for that type of evaluation. But on just-in-time, a lot of the goods come from outside the European Union area. The UK has had great success and has been a prime target for foreign direct investment into the European Union because of the efficiency and speed with which those goods are cleared. We need to ensure that that is now extended to goods coming from within the EU as well.

Travel to School: Rural Areas

Lord Bradshaw Excerpts

Wednesday 26th February 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Northover]

I do not accept what the noble Baroness said about the education maintenance allowance because the way that it is organised now focuses on the young people who are most at need and provides them with more generous support than was the case before. Therefore, a yearly bursary of up to £1,200 is available to young people from specific vulnerable groups. A number of these young people—roughly half—do indeed receive travel passes or tickets. The councils she mentioned still offer special discounts to students and young people even though in some instances they have increased the charges that they are making.

[Lord Bradshaw (LD)]

My Lords, I wonder whether the Minister might look at the supply side rather than the demand side of this equation. There are very strict rules about the operation of part-time buses and the collection of fares—all sorts of terrible regulations—which make it extremely difficult for communities to organise bus services to meet the needs which are quite obvious in rural areas.

[Baroness Northover]

My noble friend makes a good point. However, I would point him to the local authority guidance, which has just been reissued, because one of the things that local authorities need to do is to analyse what provision is there, what is needed and where the deficits might be.

Transport: HS2

Lord Bradshaw Excerpts

Tuesday 26th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bradshaw]

My Lords, I agree entirely with what the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, has just said. The existing railway lines to the north—there are in fact four—are full. When a line is 85% full, it is impossible to run a reliable service because you get degradation with every incident.

Demand is bound to increase. There will be population growth in areas around London, Essex, Kent, Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire. The very heavy extra freight which will come from the new port in London and from Felixstowe needs the railway. Of course, there are expanding markets. Without this, the railway is already expanding. Goodness knows what it would reach by the time we have HS2.

You cannot have incremental enhancement to existing lines. This would be very expensive and disruptive, as the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, has said. Such demand as there is for travel could be met by a new four-lane motorway, probably all the way from somewhere in Kent right through, around London and up to the north. However, that would be colossally expensive and disruptive. Or we could have a lot more flying. The only real choice is to have a new railway.

I was working for the railways when HS1 was built. I endorse entirely what my noble friend Lord Freeman has said. There was an enormous uproar in Kent, similar to that which we now have in the Chilterns. I asked a Labour MP whose constituency straddles HS1 how many complaints he got about noise and disruption. He said, “None at all. I get lots about gay marriage but I do not get anything about that”.

The other thing we must think of is that we need a link through London. I urge the Minister to address this significantly. The present link is very constricted. It will convey very little and offer nothing to people in Kent and Essex, huge areas of population growth, who want access to HS2 as well as Heathrow. A business case is difficult to make so far in advance. There are all sorts of external benefits which are almost impossible to measure.

The scheme will be much modified. Objectors will have their say. Rushing to judicial review in advance of the parliamentary process is premature and a waste of effort.