Road Safety (Financial Penalty Deposit) (Appropriate Amount) (Amendment) Order 2014

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Tuesday 28th January 2014 Grand Committee

[Lord Bradshaw (LD)]

I thank the noble Lord for introducing this short debate on the road safety financial deposit order. One of the things that concerns many people about road transport is not the fact that they pay a levy, but rather that there are people who do not pay. They have all sorts of means of avoiding doing so. It is no good just fining them £300 every time they do it; there should be a means of reckoning up if a haulier or a company does the same thing time and again. I would like to know if there is any method that would prevent them coming back here to offend again. People do not like paying charges and will do everything they can to avoid it.

Otherwise, I welcome this charge as perhaps the first step towards having a rational system of road pricing in this country. The calculation has taken into account such things as vehicle weight and other factors. However, it might be the beginning of a way of taking more money from those who use the road, and rather less from those who do not use it very much.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for his explanation of the purpose and objectives of the order, to which we are not opposed, and which is intended to come into force on 1 April. I am not quite sure that I have necessarily fully understood everything in the order; it may well be that the points I wish to raise will reveal that. Nevertheless, I will ask some points of clarification since the Explanatory Memorandum, which refers to the scheme as a whole, prompts a number of questions.

As the Minister has said, the order provides for financial penalty deposits to be applied where a relevant heavy goods vehicle is on a public road in the UK without the appropriate road user levy having been paid. Paragraph 7.2 of the Explanatory Memorandum states that, for an HGV registered in the UK, the levy can be paid on an annual or six-monthly basis. For an HGV registered outside the UK, the levy will reflect the amount of time it is intended to use or keep the vehicle on a public road in the UK and can be paid on a daily, weekly, monthly or annual basis. This is hardly an earth-shattering point, but why has it been decided that, for vehicles registered outside the UK, payment cannot be made on a six-monthly basis, as it can for vehicles registered in the UK?

Since, for vehicles registered outside the UK, paragraph 7.2 uses the word “intends”, does this mean —I think it does—that a levy payment will have to be made prior to the vehicles being allowed to enter the UK? Also, are there many vehicles registered outside the UK which in reality are here for most or all of the time? For vehicles registered outside the UK, what will be the daily levy rate as a percentage of the weekly and monthly rate for the same vehicle? That is, do you in effect get a discount if you are paying on a weekly, monthly or annual basis, or is it a straight multiplication of the daily levy rate?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Popat]

My Lords, under this legislation it is an offence to keep a heavy goods vehicle on the road without having paid. Impounding is one way of enforcing this. The chances are that a very small number of vehicles will be impounded because most drivers carry credit cards, or quite often they will ring the owners of the haulage vehicle to see if they can make a payment over the telephone. Over time, we will know if there are any shortcomings in the system and we will do something to improve it. The noble Lord is quite right that impounding vehicles for a long time is not practical, especially when the police have to look after the vehicles. I can assure the noble Lord that I will certainly write to him on this subject.

[Lord Rosser]

I will follow on from that because I am still not clear who decides whether the matter goes to court, as opposed to being dealt with a fixed penalty notice or a deposit. The Minister mentioned the DVSA but I was not sure whether it made the decision of whether to go to court or it decided on the fixed penalty notice or the deposit. I am still not clear how that decision is made. The noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, referred earlier to people who were repeat offenders. There may also be a case where you were able to prove that a lorry had been going around without making payment for some considerable time, which is presumably rather more serious than if it has been doing it for only a day or two. Who decides, and on what basis, whether the matter goes to court?

[Lord Popat]

My Lords, it is no different from the existing system in the UK. We issue a fixed penalty notice. If the fixed penalty notice is not paid, then the driver is prosecuted. It will be up to the DVSA and the police to prosecute someone who has not paid their fixed penalty.

[Lord Rosser]

I am simply asking what the situation is—I am not trying to make a point. Will there be no instances, even if somebody has had fixed penalty notices before, where somebody says, “No fixed penalty notice this time, we are going straight to court”? Is the only reason you will end up in court that you have not paid the fixed penalty notice?

[Lord Popat]

That is correct.

[Lord Rosser]

Is that an appropriate way of dealing with somebody who regularly offends and regularly does not make payments? Is there nothing that can happen before they end up in court and face a fine, potentially?