Motor Sport (Public Highways)

Ben Wallace Excerpts

Wednesday 30th March 2011 Westminster Hall

[Mr Ben Wallace (Wyre and Preston North) (Con)]

I am delighted to see you in the Chair, Mr Bayley. British motor sport is Britain’s great sport success story. We often hear much about football and other sports, but British motor sport undoubtedly leads the world. One need only look at the first round of this year’s Formula 1 championship to see that although a German driver crossed the finish line in the fastest car, the car was managed, designed and built in Britain, and the team was based here. Eight out of 12 Formula 1 teams are British, as are most F1 drivers and designers. Even some of the lead designers for Ferrari, the bastion of Italian motor sport, are more often than not British.

Our great teams—Williams, McLaren and now Red Bull—have proved on the world stage not only to be forerunners of new technologies and innovators in motoring but developers of British talent. Other companies such as M-Sport and Prodrive support not only Formula 1 but rallies and many other types of sporting activity on the road. Britain is and has been a world leader in motor sport, and I hope that it will continue to be one.

Motor sport is often left behind in the great sports debate. The first few sports pages of our newspapers are often taken up by football, even when the teams are full of overseas players, managed by overseas managers, owned by overseas owners and, often, languishing in the bottom of divisions after millions of pounds spent. I hope that the Government will consider my proposal to help motor sport build on its success and go forward.

We should not forget that 95% of most motor sport is amateur and consists of people participating. It is not just about the glamour and glitz of F1 or world rallying; it is about normal rallying, hill climbing, classic cars, trailing and historical cars. Anyone who lives near or visits a motor race circuit will see that sports go on there all year round, from karting to high-performance sports. Hundreds of thousands of people enjoy motor sport in Britain.

The governing body of motor sport is the Motor Sports Association, the successor to RAC MSA. It has 200,000 members and 750 affiliated motor clubs, and every year it hosts 4,500 events. The industry that feeds into that motor sport has an amazing record, with a turnover of £6 billion a year, only £2.6 billion of which is exported. Some 4,500 companies support the sport. The research and development spend—the spend for the future that trains tomorrow’s engineers and scientists—is 30% of turnover. The aerospace industry, from which I come, would be proud of such a figure, and we should do more to encourage that.

The industries on the back of motor sport—public relations, marketing, sports industry, event management—employ 38,000 people, create another £1.7 billion in turnover and involve 25,000 engineers. That is an incredible asset for this country. Some of those engineers come from my constituency, having gone to Myerscough college, which has its own team and trains young men and women to support motor teams. Some of them have gone on to work in the top flight of world motor sport.

What is wrong with motor sport? Nothing, except that we could do more for it. We could do more to allow events to take place. The problem in England and Wales is that if we want more events, and more diverse events, to take place, we cannot use the roads and highways in the same way as the Isle of Man or Northern Ireland. To do so would mean suspending numerous provisions of the Road Traffic Act 1988. We have a midway point. Something called a traffic regulation order allows access to a road to be suspended, but the provisions of the Highways Acts still apply. Drivers must still average 30 mph on the area of road closed to the public, and rights of way still exist, meaning that unless a uniformed police officer is there to prevent Mr and Mrs Smith from carrying on their business, no one is empowered to prevent them from using it.

That is why we cannot have a Grand Prix in London or a circuit around Birmingham, although other countries can. We should do something about it. That is also why, when Birmingham did have an event, sponsored by the noble Lord Rooker, it took an Act of Parliament to suspend some of the relevant provisions. Amending the 1998 Act or building on a traffic regulation order would fit with the Government’s agenda of empowering local authorities, encouraging tourism and events and putting people in charge of their communities. Perhaps we should look at something along the lines of a traffic suspension order or something that devolves the powers to a local authority.

I am not here to ask that motor sport be allowed to impose itself on communities that do not want it or that the Government give power to an unelected governing body to decide that it wants motor sport when the local community does not. I am here to ask the Government to devolve power to local authorities, so that they can decide whether they want to host an event. That could be in Brecon, north Lancashire, where I am, or north Yorkshire—anywhere they want a rally. It is about places with rarely used lanes and roads, which desperately need inward investment, tourism or to kick-start the season, perhaps, at unfashionable times of the year. Let us empower our local authorities to do that.

I hope that local authorities will realise that they are not on their own. The governing body, the MSA, issues licences for events. In motor sport, one cannot have a race without a licence from the governing body. Along with that licence comes liability cover and all the protection from being sued or from worry about not being experts in the field that my constituents and the local authority would need. I want the Government to empower local authorities to seek events when they want to and to be able to suspend aspects of the 1988 Act, but to do so in conjunction with the people who know about motor sport. I want them to be guided and provided with liability cover, so that we can, perhaps, reap the benefits.

A change would apply not only to motor sport, but to cycling. It is bizarre that some stages of the Tour de France could not happen here if the bikes averaged more than 30 miles an hour. One might deliberately create a race on a road and that in itself could break the current highways law. Therefore, a change is also about empowering local authorities to give cycling events a proper go and getting Britain to the forefront of that sport. We need only go out on a Sunday to realise how big cycling has become. I took a Boris bike out for the first time yesterday, which is the closest I get to it, but I could not find a rack when I got to the other end, so it was a bit of disaster—I digress.

We should seek a change. It is easy and the benefits are clear. On tourism, as we can see with the Jim Clark rally in Scotland and motor sport all over the country, if we bring thousands of tourists into parts of the country that do not normally get them, it is a great thing. On the spend, Lancashire has a great link to the Isle of Man and the tourist trophy—TT—race. Every summer thousands of people pour over to the Isle of Man to see that great, historic race, and they help that island with its tourism very much. We could really benefit from that.

On promoting motor sport, we have to keep recruiting the engineers and drivers of the future. We have to remind people that motor sport is not only about Formula 1, but about local teams, local rallying and local engineering. It reminds people what can be done with engineering. People do not just have to build bridges, but can invent some of the very best in motor sport, materials and so on. It is also about community involvement, such as marshalling, and people getting involved in their area and taking part in a great event. We should not forget the circus coming to town. It is a great unifier in parts of the country.

I understand that people have sought this power since 1928. If the Government support them, and I hope they will, it will have been a long time coming. The previous Labour Government were supportive and never objected in any of my discussions with Labour Ministers, but we have not finally done the deed. I hope that we will. The First Minister of Scotland has spoken up in support of the change—no doubt eying the potential opportunities for the forests in Aberdeenshire and the Western Isles. We cannot take current venues for granted. Forestry Commission charges have a prohibitive effect on some rallying. The British leg of the world rally series is under threat due to some very prohibitive charges. We need to ensure that we are always able to offer alternatives.

I hope that the Minister gives us some good news and realises that the House has been supportive of a change, so it has cross-party support. It is a simple issue and would require bureaucratic measures. It is not a great ideological argument about policy and it is not about imposing our will on different communities. It is about giving power to local authorities, where it suits them, to engage with a successful British sport, promote it and allow all those followers of motor sport and cycling up and down the country to finally get out and race. If they cannot afford a Formula 1 car, they can still get out and race.

Let us not forget education. We can teach young men and women to drive responsibly and learn to drive high-speed performance cars, while teaching them that there is a time for racing and a time for driving on a normal road. That will have a lot of benefits. Perhaps we can divert some of the boy racers away from racing though my village at 2 am and away from tragic accidents, and encourage them to get involved in a motor sport that perhaps becomes more affordable and accessible to a lot of them. They could all play a part in it.

I look forward to the Minister’s response. I have spoken to him in the past about a change, and the Government have been supportive. It would fit with our localism agenda, the big society and with rewarding one of Britain’s great sports and industries.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mike Penning]

I am afraid that my hon. Friend might have to speak to my wife, who has very kindly allowed me to go as long as she is with me.

On a serious note, the debate has been very useful. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Wyre and Preston North not just for securing the debate, but for being informative before it took place. That meant I had the chance to do my homework and listen to representations from the MSA and many people in my constituency. I represent one of the most socially deprived wards and one of the most affluent villages, so there is a good spectrum in terms of the excitement about such an event taking place.

[Mr Wallace]

Does my hon. Friend agree that what is amazing about motor sport is that the supporters are often low profile? It is only when there is an event such as this, that one receives dozens of e-mails from constituents who come out of woodwork and who one never knew were keen supporters of the sport. Such people take part in club events every weekend.

[Mike Penning]

I never cease to be fascinated by how many people get up in the very early hours of the morning on a weekend to watch Formula 1, like we all did last weekend. We were even up for the practice sessions, which I am sure makes us complete anoraks, but we were up and so were millions and millions of other people. This is not a class issue. This is not about the affluent. One of the reasons why the younger chaps in my constituency tell me that they are always out and about in their go-faster cars is that they do not feel that they have an outlet. I am not saying that they are bad guys—they are not. They are just frustrated. They would like to have an outlet to give them an opportunity. This measure, especially if it is done properly—