Airports: London

Lord Davies of Oldham Excerpts

Monday 10th June 2013 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, the Airports Commission will look at all sites including Maplin Sands or the Thames Estuary airport, and will then come up with a shortlist of which options need to be looked at in greater detail.

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

The Minister has shown great sagacity in indicating that there may be a change in government. His answers thus far have indicated that one of the two parties that form the coalition votes on one great negative—namely, no to the third runway at Heathrow—and intends to present itself before the next election with absolutely no advance in policy whatever.

[Earl Attlee]

It was the party opposite that came up with a policy for a third runway at Heathrow with no consensus and therefore it did not survive a change in government.

Railways: Crossrail

Lord Davies of Oldham Excerpts

Wednesday 5th June 2013 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, the noble Lord is right that we will need to see a full business case for the revised scheme, and we hope to receive this from Transport for London in the next few weeks. We also need to see a convincing proposition for how the scheme could be funded and DfT officials are exploring options with TfL. I agree with the noble Lord about property benefits but it is difficult to capture them.

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

My Lords, the House will appreciate the progress which has been made on Crossrail and the Minister will know this has been met through a publicly funded system. Why on earth did the Government not follow this process on Thameslink? The severely critical report published today by the National Audit Office states that reliance on a complex mix of public and private finance means that the trains for this project may not be delivered on time.

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, the NAO report, due to be published today, has been agreed by the department. The report is broadly positive. We welcome the scrutiny of the NAO and are pleased that it has recognised the good progress we have made in delivering the first stage of the infrastructure part of the programme on time and under budget.

Railways: East Coast Main Line

Lord Davies of Oldham Excerpts

Tuesday 4th June 2013 Lords Chamber

Asked By

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether consideration has been given to extending the management by Directly Operated Railways of the east coast main line franchise.

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, the Government carefully considered a number of issues before announcing the franchising programme schedule on 26 March. This schedule sees the commencement of a new franchise on the intercity east coast in February 2015. This will return the franchise to the private sector after an extended period of public control, putting in place a long-term partner for the significant investment that the Government will make in the east coast main line in future years.

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

My Lords, I have two questions. Will the noble Earl confirm that his ministerial colleague in the other place got it wrong when he stated that the publicly operated east coast main line returned a lower figure to the Treasury than the privately operated west coast? The 2011-12 figures show the opposite: £156 million was returned to the Treasury from Virgin on the west coast and £177 million was returned from the publicly operated east coast service, so my second question is this: what, apart from political dogma, inspires the Government to propose ending the east coast‘s successful operation?

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, on the noble Lord’s first question, the short answer is no. During the three years to 2012, the Treasury received £411 million and £450 million from the east coast and west coast rail franchises respectively. This is completely separate from the money that the DfT paid to Virgin Trains as part of the revenue-based risk-sharing mechanism, which by its nature is variable, so the statement that my right honourable friend made is factually accurate. The bottom line is that the plans that we have set out will drive improvements to rail services and put passengers at the heart of a revitalised rail franchising system. It is also important to remember that rail franchises are not directly comparable.

It was never intended for the east coast main line to remain in the public sector. Indeed, when the then Secretary of State, the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, explained in this House in July 2009 the decision to bring the line into public control, he said:

“I do not believe that it would be in the public interest for us to have a nationalised train operating company indefinitely”.—[Official Report, 1/7/09; col. 232.]

Daylight Saving

Lord Davies of Oldham Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd May 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

My Lords, I have considerable sympathy with argument made by the noble Lord, Lord Tanlaw. The statistics have pointed this way for a considerable period. However, surely it would be inopportune for the Government to consider legislation on this matter at present, knowing full well that a significant body of opinion in Scotland is very hostile to the measure and it would look as though this Parliament were seeking to pre-empt the important issues of the referendum.

[Earl Attlee]

The noble Lord makes a very good point. The difficulty in Scotland, if we went for single/double summer time is that it would be getting light at 10 o’clock in the morning in some places. Time is a devolved matter for Scotland and for Northern Ireland, but the Government are clear that there should be one time zone throughout the United Kingdom.

Transport: Bus Services

Lord Davies of Oldham Excerpts

Monday 20th May 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

My Lords, the Minister regaled the House with a list of optimistic policies that the Government were pursuing with regard to buses. However, if the grant and support for local buses are reduced by 20%, how on earth are any of these policies going to make a real difference? Will he recognise that there is absolutely no point in the Prime Minister guaranteeing the bus pass for pensioners if there are no buses for them to travel on?

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, I am a little disappointed. I thought that the noble Lord would have given me a much better run for my money. I accept that there has to be a 20% cut in the bus service operators grant. It is painful. My honourable friend Mr Norman Baker would have liked not to have done it—I am sure he would have fought hard to avoid it—but the best way of reducing the budget is to make small cuts everywhere, and we have had to make a small cut in the bus service operators grant. However, the effect on the bus service mileage has not been as much as one might expect.

Roads: New and Young Drivers

Lord Davies of Oldham Excerpts

Monday 18th March 2013 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, probationary plates are one of the things that we are considering in order to deal with that sort of problem, possibly linked with other measures—for instance, not allowing young or new drivers to carry young passengers.

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

My Lords, of course we are happy to support any measure that improves the safety record of young drivers. However, that does not mean that we support the pricing of young drivers off our roads. The increase in insurance for young drivers last year was 53%. How do we expect young people, particularly in rural areas, to be able to get to jobs, apprenticeships or even education institutions if they cannot afford to run a car?

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, the noble Lord makes an important point. Some of the measures we are thinking of have a cost and could have an adverse impact, perhaps meaning that young drivers do not bother with a driving licence at all. Therefore, we have to be very careful about what measures we put in place. As to the noble Lord’s substantive point about the cost of insurance, we are well aware of this. At a previous encounter, I said that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State was shortly to have a meeting with the insurance industry. We intend to hold a further meeting with the motor insurance industry on 25 March, following the successful summits held last year aimed at tackling the high cost of premiums, especially for young drivers.

Republic of Ireland: Aids to Navigation

Lord Davies of Oldham Excerpts

Monday 25th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, I agree that there has been surprising co-operation between the Republic of Ireland and the UK Government over many years. It is important to understand that the general lighthouse authorities will continue to co-operate around the coasts of the UK and the Republic of Ireland.

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

My Lords, the House will of course welcome the optimistic and accurate position which the noble Earl has reflected. However, the urgency of the situation ought not to be underestimated. General shipping costs are going up 11% this year on these dues. For shorter crossings and ferries, they are going up by 43%. People have ways of avoiding these costs, such as by putting into other ports if costs continue to escalate. I therefore hope that, in the time before the full Irish payments come in, increases in costs are kept to an absolute minimum.

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, throughout this process, all GLAs have managed to reduce their operating costs, which is a great benefit to the shipping industry. We will shortly determine the light dues for 2013-14, but there is already a commitment from the Government that in cash terms they will not go up. One of the beauties of light dues is that they are quite a difficult tax to avoid. It is pretty obvious when you take a big ship into a harbour.

HGV Road User Levy Bill

Lord Davies of Oldham Excerpts

Thursday 7th February 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

My Lords, Her Majesty’s Opposition welcome the Bill, and regard a great deal of it as eminently workable. It will improve the situation and remedy a grievance that we have recognised for many years, as far as our road haulage industry is concerned. That does not mean that we do not have some criticisms of the Bill. I had a few carefully listed, but half of them have been made by my noble friend Lord Berkeley in his excellent speech, and the other half by the noble Lord, Lord Snape, in his similarly excellent contribution.

There was just one point that the noble Lords did not talk about, which was to do with a strategy for roads that might involve road charging. There is a provision in the Bill which clearly anticipates that the devolved Administrations must have some opportunity if they wish to do this, and the noble Lord, Lord Wigley, of course has presented the Minister with that question.

My speech is therefore greatly reduced, because on the whole I am very much in favour of the Bill and somewhat less pessimistic than my noble friend Lord Snape about the issue of enforcement. I am sure that the Minister is going to establish that technology has moved on with concepts like automatic number plate recognition, which allows vehicles to be identified with great readiness and pulled over and stopped effectively by VOSA, which of course is responsible for implementing this part of the administration.

[Lord Snape]

I apologise for interrupting my noble friend. There is a question that I should have put to the Minister, but perhaps he could do so equally well. Supposing a lorry driver is stopped for not having a proper piece of paper saying that he has paid £200. What happens then? Is he to be detained at the port of exit? Are we going to reinvoke the European arrest warrant if he heads home? Perhaps my noble friend could question the Minister about that.

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

My Lords, the driver is responsible for the vehicle and its legitimacy, so he will be stopped all right, and the vehicle will not be released until the necessary charge has been paid. I doubt if the driver will have £5,000—which is the maximum fine—in his back pocket, so the charge will go to his office in the country from which he has come, and that office will have to pay. I agree entirely that it is hard luck on the driver, if that is the sentiment my noble friend is putting forward—but the people who own the lorry have to comply with the law, and I understand that it will be enforced. We would all expect it to be enforced and modern technology will ensure that it is.

I have had sympathy with the road haulage industry and with British motorists for a very long period—from the first time I went to France and found that French autoroutes could charge heavily while we provided free roads for any French motorists who deigned to come to Britain. That always seemed a little unfair. The situation for road haulage is much more serious. After all, the industry shifts 68% of our goods and employs 220,000 workers. Many of them are skilled, because driving in modern conditions on all roads, both European and British, requires skill and concentration. We should recognise the importance of the industry. The issue became more acute when, as the House will recall, additional fuel tanks were placed on heavy vehicles so that not only did they not pay for the roads but they did not buy any fuel in Britain, because continental fuel was cheaper. The sense of obvious unfairness—the feeling that something needs to be done—has been with us for some time.

We will take advantage of the Eurovignette to make progress on this. When some critics of the European Community say that nothing good comes out of Europe, I commend the concept of the vignette—what a wonderful, attractive word to describe a piece of necessary legislation, particularly as it is derived from its original meaning of a small illustration with no defined borders. That looks entirely appropriate for the European directive on which this legislation is based. It will bring considerable benefits, but I expect the Minister to respond to the points made by my noble friends and the noble Lord, Lord Wigley. I am certain that he will make every effort to emphasise the necessary compliance procedures for these requirements, because the idea that people would flout these charges and get away with it after we have put the legislation in place would appal us all.

One issue that the Road Haulage Association always complains about, which did not come up, is cabotage—the deployment of these lorries to be used for transfers of goods within the country, at the comparative advantage indicated by lower fuel costs. This Bill does nothing significant about that. Perhaps the Minister will comment on it.

I am also most interested in the revenues that will be derived from the successful implementation of this measure. Both my noble friends emphasised the fact that these lorries cost a great deal in terms of the maintenance of our roads. I am sure that all noble Lords have travelled on our motorways and have noticed that on many roads the middle and outside lanes have reasonably good surfaces while there are almost two trenches on the inside lane where the heavy goods vehicles progress. Of course, the majority of those are British trucks, but it shows the cost to the roads system that heavy goods vehicles incur—in particular because Europe has been very much to the fore in increasing the size and weight of lorries over the years. My noble friend Lord Snape indicated that the 44-tonner was, after all, brought in on the basis of European initiatives.

What is going to happen to this revenue? The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, had his worries about where it was going and asked why this was a money Bill. It is a money Bill because the enforcement of the charges is a form of taxation. This money is not hypothecated to anything to do with road usage or necessity, but goes happily into the Consolidated Fund. We all know what the Consolidated Fund means in terms of priorities. What it certainly means is that we can guarantee that none of this revenue relates to road expenditure. My noble friends emphasised the costs to the road system.

There is another dimension that I want to bring up: road safety. The Road Safety Foundation has made it quite emphatically clear that the actual design of roads, which costs money to do well, is an important contribution to road safety. One particular group of road users who have been vulnerable to lorries in recent years are cyclists. The difference between the road structure in Amsterdam and the road structure in London is so evidently a crucial reason why Amsterdam cyclists feel safe and London cyclists often ride in terror—with just cause. We have had a number of serious accidents and fatalities where cyclists have been hit by lorry drivers who had no idea the cyclist was present.

Safety issues can be improved now because there is the possibility of fitting out lorries with sensors and mirrors that eliminate blind spots, but they cost money. We would need some enforcement. At present, the price of doing nothing is a risk to cyclists in all our cities and the price is becoming greater each year.

I cannot hope to direct the proceeds of this Bill towards safety because, as I say, there is no chance of hypothecation. However, I hope that the Minister will recognise that that which assists the development of road haulage and, in one respect, brings some sense of fairness between the British road haulage system and continental trucks coming into Britain should also be attended by some concern about road safety.

The Minister has quite a lot on his plate to answer, in the challenges that have been presented in the speeches from the Back Benches. I merely endorse the questions that have been asked, because they are exceedingly pertinent. I hope that the Minister’s answer is sufficiently strong for the Opposition to remain confident that this measure is an advantageous one for the country.

Railways: Fares

Lord Davies of Oldham Excerpts

Thursday 31st January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, I know how much my noble friend supports HS2. The business case for HS2 is not predicated on premium fares.

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

My Lords, I am surprised that the Minister takes a patronising attitude to what the public understand. The public understand fare increases quite clearly. The National Audit Office warned that if excessive fare increases occurred they would merely be reflected in higher profits for the train operating companies. The Prime Minister said that fares should not go up by more than 1% above inflation—in other words, 4.2%. How does the Minister justify fare increases of 9%?

[Earl Attlee]

My Lords, a fare increase of 9% can arise where you have the RPI plus one, plus the flexibility that is necessary in order that train operating companies can adjust their fares to suit changing conditions. For instance, let us suppose there was a new shopping centre in an adjacent town. It might be desirable to adjust the pricing structure to reflect that. If there were no flexibility, train operators would not be able to adjust their price structure but would have to stick with an old system.

Railways: High Speed Rail

Lord Davies of Oldham Excerpts

Monday 28th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement made earlier in the Commons. I welcome the Statement, of course. The Minister made the presumption that there was agreement between the major parties on this project and indeed there is. He will know that I endorse the main strategy that is proposed in the paper, and I welcome the fact that this announcement is being made today.

Inevitably, however, there are differences between us, and I will seek to identify some of them for the good of the Government in the time in which they have to make judgments on this important project. I emphasise to the House that in the long run this project will bring strength to the British economy and relieve the pressure on rail lines, particularly the west coast main line, which the Minister rightly identified as running at very close to capacity, but it has nothing at all to do with the rhetoric that he brought into the Statement about jobs and improving our economy at the present time. The idea that the proposals contained in the Statement, which, after all, refer to a project that will not be completed for over a decade from now, will bring an enormous stimulus to the economy and create jobs at present is quite erroneous. I rather regret that the noble Earl has rightly emphasised that we welcome this. Of course we will do our best in opposition and in government to see the fulfilment of the project.

There are inflections in this speech which seem to be addressed to our contemporary economic troubles. This project is too far away to actually deliver a great deal of improvement prior to the next general election or even several years after that. However we welcome the project for the reasons put forward by the noble Earl, not least in terms of the pressure upon existing rail provision in the United Kingdom. He makes the important point that no railway line has been created north of London for more than 120 years.

The Government are still not committing themselves to aspects which we would have thought would give a real sense of urgency to this timetable. Why does this Statement make no attempt to bring the legislation necessary for phase 2 into the timetable for phase 1? Surely one Bill—which might necessitate a carryover facility—dealing with the whole project is bound to be a better prospect than the Government going through all their travails over London to Birmingham, and then starting all over again with a fresh Bill for the lines north of Birmingham.

We also regret that the Statement makes no real approach towards another area of future transport on which we have sought to establish consensus, namely the future of aviation in the south-east. Why do the Government not address their mind to the possibility of a direct link to Heathrow? Surely that would improve connections as far as airports are concerned? It would certainly help with short-haul flights bringing people into Heathrow if they could then travel speedily by train. That would reduce the pressure on Heathrow for short-range flights and the slots which they occupy, giving the airport, with its present colossal problem, a chance to breathe. As the public know very well, every time we have two or three inches of snow, as we have had recently, there is a crisis at Heathrow because it is right up against the margins of capacity with no flexibility for dealing with such a situation. I regret that there is no suggestion of looking at a link to Heathrow.

Where northern cities beyond Birmingham are concerned, we welcome the fact that Manchester and Leeds are to be served. It should be recognised that we need to look at the rail infrastructure for link-up with other major cities apart from those two. High-speed trains will of course bring immediate and direct benefits to those, but we also need assurances from the Government that issues will be addressed so that those cities which are not directly on the line—only two are—will benefit significantly.

We are concerned about another dimension of the high-speed rail proposals. The lines from the north will connect with High Speed 1, the link to the continent. The intensity of interest in this possibility goes back decades. Since High Speed 1 has been in place, served by the magnificent station at St Pancras, there has also been great interest. However, what will happen to these trains from the north? When they get to London, they are meant to clank around the back part of the rail service which Transport for London regards as critical to all its services around London. That line, of course, has speed limitations, to put it at its mildest. The Government are still looking at a situation in which those from the north will have a slow perambulation around London if they are bent upon getting to the continent.

Nevertheless, there is a great deal in this Statement that we welcome. We welcome the fact that it is being made; at least that is an indication that the penny has dropped for the Government, and that there is some urgency about these matters. However we still feel that the Statement could have been much more clearly expressed in terms of urgency for getting this line constructed, to both Birmingham and the cities of the north.