Drivers’ Hours and Tachographs (Temporary Exceptions) (No. 4) Regulations 2021

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Monday 6th December 2021 Lords Chamber

We need a more constructive approach to improving standards and quality of employment for HGV drivers, and I recommend that the Minister looks at the relais routiers in France. That might not be a popular idea with the current Government, but it is a well-established system that provides good facilities, and I would welcome reassurance from the Minister that, now that the number of HGV drivers is beginning to pick up somewhat, we will not see this measure come back again.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

These regulations, made at the end of October, further extend the relaxation limits to HGV drivers’ hours until 10 January next year, at which point this temporary exemption will have been in place continuously for six months, since 12 July this year. The instrument extends the normal daily limit of nine hours’ driving a day to 10 hours, up to four times a week, with an overarching limit of 56 hours’ driving in a week and 90 hours in a fortnight—or, as an alternative, introduces an amended weekly rest pattern that allows an additional day of driving in a fortnight, provided that an equivalent period of rest is taken before the end of the third week. This exception increases the maximum permitted driving time in a fortnight to 99 hours from the standard 90 hours.

In its 18th report of the current Session, published on 11 November, the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, as the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, said, repeated its concerns

“that cumulative tiredness in HGV drivers may constitute a road safety hazard”.

It said:

“The responses to the consultation exercise quoted in the Explanatory Memorandum ... also take that view and add that these Regulations make HGV drivers’ working conditions worse, which is having a negative effect on recruitment”.


Continuing, the committee said—again I repeat something that the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, said:

“Our concern is bolstered by figures … that indicate that a significant proportion (27%) of the drivers stopped in roadside checks are breaching the Drivers’ Hours legislation. We have repeatedly asked the Department for Transport to provide evidence that would allay our concerns, but the responses have indicated that the Department does not have information either way”.


The department has said that it has

“not been made aware of any increase in accidents involving HGVs since the temporary exceptions to the drivers’ hours rules were first introduced in July 2021”.

That, not surprisingly, says the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, is “not sufficient to allay” its concerns.

Therefore, I invite the Government to say in their response what evidence they have that the relaxation of limits to HGV drivers’ hours provided for in these regulations, which have been in effect for nearly five months, does not increase cumulative tiredness to an extent that constitutes a road safety hazard. On how many occasions has the relaxation in hours provided for in these regulations actually been used, and by how many different firms? Why does the Department for Transport not have figures on the proportion of drivers stopped in roadside checks who breached drivers’ hours legislation in force at the time they were stopped? I would have thought that that was a fairly important piece of information, which one would have thought the Department for Transport would have.

The Department for Transport provided the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee with 28 short, medium and long-term interventions it had put in place to alleviate the existing HGV driver shortage. One can of course take the government line that this shows how active and focused they are in seeking to address the driver shortage—a shortage that they have known about for years but have nevertheless still been caught on the hop by—or one can take the view that the Government do not know what steps will address the driver shortage issue. That would be consistent with their inability to provide the information and meaningful assurances sought by the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, and would suggest that the 28 interventions simply reflect an approach more akin to thrashing around in all directions hoping that a course of action will finally turn up trumps.

The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee says in its report on the list of 28 interventions that

“while this list shows the various strands of the Department’s current activity, we still lack a strategic statement of the programme’s objectives, milestones and costs, against which its effectiveness and value for money can be assessed.”

Can the Government now provide that strategic statement, either in their response today or subsequently, and indicate the cost of each of the 28—or perhaps now more—interventions and the specific impact each one is expected to have on the existing HGV driver shortage, bearing in mind that the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, has argued that these specific regulations on drivers’ hours will not address the underlying causes of the shortage?

On one specific intervention, namely increasing cabotage for foreign hauliers in the UK, which extends through to the end of April next year, can the Government say today how that meets the Prime Minister’s previously stated desire to see significantly higher pay for UK drivers? Allowing foreign transport operators to make unlimited journeys in the UK for two weeks before returning home can only mean UK drivers facing more competition for work, which will depress rather than increase levels of pay, as previously desired by the Prime Minister.

The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee commented that no formal impact assessment had been prepared and that the Explanatory Memorandum provided no information on how many additional HGV journeys might be added by this instrument or what the take-up by foreign operators might be. Continuing, the committee said:

“We therefore have no means to assess whether the number of operators involved will constitute a threat to the UK workforce, or to measure whether the legislation is likely to be effective.”


Can the Government in their response give some figures to indicate what the impact has been to date of this relaxation in restrictions on cabotage?

It appears that the underlying causes of the driver shortage—and I will not go through all the reasons mentioned by the noble Earl, Lord Attlee—relate to pay and conditions, including the provision of decent facilities for drivers away from the cab of their vehicle. The job, and the standing it has at present, does not appear attractive, particularly to younger people. The workforce is overwhelmingly older white males and is certainly not diverse, which means that the actual potential recruitment pool is less than it might be. I understand that pay is now rising, turnover is falling, provisional licences are increasing and further improvements are anticipated in the new year—albeit there is still a shortage which will not be properly addressed until next year.

I am sure the Government will have some hard information to give on the current driver shortage situation today in their response and the extent to which it is the Government’s 28—or is it 32?—measures that have or have not delivered, and the extent to which they agree with the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, on the underlying causes of the shortage of HGV drivers, which these regulations on relaxation of limits to hours, the noble Earl has powerfully argued, fail to address.

[Viscount Stansgate (Lab)]

My Lords, before the Minister gets up to reply, could she tell the House whether it is the Government’s intention to renew these regulations next year, and, if so, why and on what basis?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

The noble Baroness made reference to the driver hours relaxation and gave some figures, for which I thank her very much. Is not the real explanation of why those figures are low that, in the consultation, the proposition was opposed by the Road Haulage Association as well as Unite the Union? Clearly they were not going to queue up to use it, because they did not agree with it anyway.

I notice as well that the noble Baroness said that the cabotage extension is limited, so that is two of the 28 items down here where the Minister herself has admitted that they have had a fairly limited impact. I suggest that it is not the Government’s 28 items—or indeed 32, if that is what it is now. The biggest one so far as far as road haulage drivers are concerned has been the increase in pay that has happened. I do not think that this featured too highly in the 28 courses of action to which the Government referred.

Finally, what is the significant proportion of drivers stopped in roadside checks who are breaching the drivers’ hours legislation? I gather that it is not the 27% that was quoted in one survey, so what is the figure? Why was it that the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee repeatedly asked the Department for Transport to provide evidence that would allay its concerns but the responses indicated that the department does not have information either way. Why did not the department provide any information then?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

I could possibly give an entirely new speech on this but I would probably not be popular if I did—my Whip agrees with me.

The RHA wanted something entirely different—we know that. It always wanted us to open the floodgates and allow EU drivers to come in. Indeed, I am looking at the noble Lord and trying to remember whether any good ideas have come from the Benches opposite as to how we solve the HGV crisis. I believe Keir Starmer wanted to open the doors to 100,000 EU drivers—that was the Labour way of solving this crisis. We have taken a very different stance. As the noble Lord will know, no EU drivers are willing to come flooding in anyway, as I have said many times. We have set out a range of short, medium and long-term actions. Some are very substantial; for example, we removed the HGV levy. That saves hauliers lots of money, and from that money they can pay their staff more. We have also frozen VED. As I have said right from the outset, there is not one thing that will fix this; it is a whole succession of things. Some are short, medium and long term, some are big and others are little; that is why we have 32 actions. I am proud of those 32 actions and I believe that they are fixing the crisis.