Bus Services (No. 2) Bill [HL]

Lord Grayling Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 28th January 2025 Grand Committee

[The Earl of Effingham (Con)]

I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, that in the same way that we saw her speaking to other noble Lords on the previous Bill, when she said this was happening in the Chamber, we should continue with the proceedings and listen to what everyone has to say, which is everyone’s right in this Room.

[Lord Grayling (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak only briefly, but I want to raise a particular point with the Minister on which I would like his clarification. What I would say to the noble Baroness who has just spoken is that, having just arrived in this place from the House of Commons, I find it noticeable that the depth of scrutiny of Bills seems to be rather deeper here. In many ways, as a former MP, I regret that, as it should not be like that. It is important that legislation is scrutinised carefully and questions are asked. I think that this House plays a very important role in ensuring that legislation is as good as it possibly can be.

The issue I have to raise with the Minister is the reason I support the amendment moved by my noble friend. I worry that ideology may sometimes get in the way of good service. I know that it would not happen in his case—I have the highest respect for the Minister—but I can quote one or two other examples in government, the future of academies, for example, where ideology seems to be treading on the toes of what is best for young people. I would not wish that to happen in the area of transport and buses, and I have misgivings about the Government’s plans to allow the setting-up of municipal bus companies. There is no obvious mechanism to ensure that there is a high-quality case for doing so.

I have also been quite worried about a simple principle. One of the things that has always attracted me to deregulation is the ability of an individual or a group of individuals to decide that the firm they work for is not doing a good job, so they will set one up in competition and do a better job themselves. I see no real reason why a simple clause such as this that places a duty on not just the Minister personally but those who work for him to ensure that the decisions they take, the interactions they have and the things that follow through from this legislation deliver high-quality, better bus services and are not just there for ideological reasons.

My noble friend mentioned London and the concern that certainly exists outside London. What makes London distinctive in bus terms is that it is vastly more subsidised than any other part of the country. I remember as Secretary of State being surprised to discover the level of discrepancy. What we all want is the best possible service. That is why I relaxed the franchising rules five years ago. I cannot see the objection to a simple clause that places a duty on the Minister and the teams who work for him to ensure that every decision taken is the best one for the passenger.

[Baroness Pidgeon (LD)]

As we start our detailed examination of this bus legislation, we should not forget that 1.6 billion passenger journeys were made by bus across England outside London in 2023 and that buses are essential for people to get to school, college, work or appointments and to have access to shops and leisure. A good bus service provides wider economic and social benefits for local communities, businesses and public services. As we start our deliberations today in Committee, we on the Liberal Democrat Benches overall welcome this legislation, which is looking to improve bus services, grow the number of passengers using buses and ensure a more reliable network connecting people and places. Our approach is to make improvements to the Bill to tackle the problem that bus services in many communities across the country fall far short of the required standard and level of service. As I stated at Second Reading, this situation must change. Reliable public transport is not a luxury. It is a necessity, especially for those who are most vulnerable.

Amendment 1 would place a duty on the Secretary of State to have regard to the purpose of the Act, namely, to improve the performance and quality of bus passenger services in Great Britain. It is similar to the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Gascoigne, to the public ownership of the railways legislation last autumn. At face value, it is impossible to disagree with this statement. It is fundamental to this legislation and the range of areas covered in it that this is about improving bus services across the country, rather like the rail legislation was the Government’s first response to improving our railways. In many parts of the country, our bus services have reached a crisis point and, indeed, are virtually non-existent. Therefore, improved performance and quality of bus passenger services must surely be the clear aim of this legislation. This amendment would make it clear that the primary, but not the only, purpose of the Bill is to improve the performance and quality of services.

My Amendment 52, in the third group, would place a broad duty on authorities to promote bus services in their jurisdiction, with a lot of detail regarding measures to consider. A report every two years covers the point about improvement to services and, in my view, deals with this issue in a more comprehensive and devolved manner, which is much better suited to this legislation.

The comments made by the noble Earl, Lord Effingham, about one size fits all do not reflect the legislation before us today, which provides a range of options for local transport authorities to choose the best option for their area and community. This is not about putting the London bus model across the country; it is about using whichever model suits local areas. I look forward to hearing from the Minister how the Government will respond to this amendment, how they interpret these words and, if they do not support them, whether they have other words that they may bring forward instead.

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[Lord Grayling (Con)]

My Lords, again I rise briefly to follow my noble friend on these matters and to ask the Minister to give some thought to some of them before we get to Report. I want to return to the issue of ideology. I have never taken an ideological approach to this. That is why we have franchising in Manchester; I legislated for it, and I am very pleased that it has worked. I think that the London model, although it is heavily subsidised, has proved to be very good. I am not convinced that it is viable everywhere in the country. I am very pleased that it works in Cornwall, but I am far from convinced that it would work in Surrey.

The issue is this: the Minister is a respected figure in the transport world, but he is part of a Government who are pretty ideological and part of a party that in local government is pretty ideological. Ultimately, ideology should never take precedence over what is right for the consumer or passenger, but sometimes it does. I shall give him a practical example. I do not believe for a second, outwith being a member of a Labour Government, that he would seriously argue that bringing Chiltern Railways into state control, given how well it has performed over the past 25 years, is genuinely going to lead to a quantum better service for passengers. All I am seeking to do in probing him on this is to ask him, perhaps today or perhaps on Report, to address the question of what the safeguards are if ideology treads on the toes of good service for the passenger. If a decision by a local authority or a mayoral combined authority is genuinely going to provide a negative or uncertain impact for the passenger, there should be at least a duty in the Bill for that franchising authority to have regard to quality and not simply exclude the private sector for ideological reasons because it wants to take buses into a municipal bus company or run it in a particular way. Ultimately, the interests of the passenger should always come first. I seek his reassurance. Perhaps he will give some thought ahead of Report to how he is going to ensure that some of the issues that my noble friend has rightly raised are properly reflected in the legislation so that the customer really will always come first.

[Lord Woodley (Lab)]

First, I apologise again for my premature interjection earlier. I was given the wrong running order. I should have checked it; I was stupid. I am going to speak to Amendments 7, 17, 18, 19, and 20, which are in my name, and talk about the potential effects on working men and women who run this fantastic service that we all rely on so much.

Although existing legislation extends service notice periods, they are much shorter than the time required to roll out franchising. There is no doubt about that. I believe that procurement of services takes around nine months, followed by a further nine months for mobilisation. Amendment 7 addresses the risk that unsuccessful or unscrupulous operators could run down services prior to new franchises, affecting service continuity and potentially putting members’ jobs at risk. Therefore, will the Minister commit to assessing whether further regulation is needed to ensure service continuity where local transport authorities pursue franchising?

Feedback from those involved in the rollout of franchising in Manchester, the only area outside London yet to implement franchising, is that early and meaningful engagement with trade unions is vital to its success. The Department for Transport has said that it would “expect” all local authorities to engage with trade unions. However, expectations are not enough. Amendment 17 seeks to learn from the experiences of Manchester and ensure that all local authorities take a consultative approach with the unions and have a joint staff forum in place as recommended. This ensures consistency across the country and best possible outcomes for franchising. Will the Minister commit to publishing a code of practice or guidance for local transport authorities to follow as part of the franchise process?

Finally, my Amendments 18, 19 and 20 would strengthen staff protection in areas where local authorities implement franchising. As the Bill reverses the ban on new local authority bus companies, Amendment 18 seeks to ensure that provisions around the transfer of staff apply. There is a risk that bus operators under franchise contracts will seek to drive down pay and conditions in a race to the bottom or employ new starters on inferior pay and conditions.

Amendment 19 proposes that workers’ terms and conditions will be maintained for the duration of the franchise to prevent the creation of a two-tier workforce by ensuring that new staff are not employed on inferior terms. Although TUPE will apply when services transfer to new operators, these regulations need strengthening so that staff are protected not just at the point of transfer but throughout the franchising process.

Amendment 20 would establish that as soon as a local authority launches its franchising consultation, the full coverage of TUPE will apply. Will the Minister commit to bringing forward the regulations or statutory guidance around protections for staff that Amendments 18, 19 and 20 seek to address?

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The noble Lord, Lord Grayling, asked what the safeguards are. The elected nature of local authorities is one such safeguard, because they are elected by local communities. The other way round—the counterfactual —is that local communities currently have no protection against the pre-emptory withdrawal of commercial bus services by a commercial operator. That has happened in several cases—in fact, including in the noble Lord’s own area.

[Lord Grayling (Con)]

Will the Minister accept a challenge on that point? He will know that, in terms of the current role of local authorities in areas such as mine, if that happens, they will step in and provide a service where the private sector cannot do so. It is not as if there is a total vacuum and the local community is completely exposed to the decisions taken by the bus operator.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for his interjection. In his case, it is true, but there are other cases where the market has shown a considerable inability to respond across the country.

To conclude on Amendment 14, it is for the reasons I gave that I ask the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, not to press his amendment.

Amendment 15 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, would require a local transport authority to carry out a preliminary assessment if it was considering franchising its bus services. Much of what the noble Lord has proposed to be included in the preliminary assessment is already included in the current legislation and must be included in the local transport authority’s franchising assessment. An assessment may or may not conclude that franchising is the best option. The assessment would then be published if an independent assessment had been carried out and the decision was that franchising was the best option. This amendment is therefore unnecessary, and I would welcome the noble Lord not pressing it.

Amendment 16 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, seeks to impose a five-year moratorium on repeating franchising scheme assessments in the same area if the previous attempt was unsuccessful. The aim of the Bill is to simplify the process for authorities wishing to pursue franchising, ensuring that decisions are made at the appropriate level and in a timely manner. This amendment would introduce unnecessary constraints on local transport authorities by adopting an overly rigid approach. There are many factors that might lead an authority to decide against pursuing franchising initially, only to reconsider this later; indeed, the period of time suggested by the noble Lord would in some cases exceed the cycle of local authority elections, in which a different party that chooses to do something different might be elected. Imposing a blanket restriction limits authorities’ ability to respond flexibly to evolving conditions and opportunities. Assessments are costly and time-consuming so will not be undertaken lightly. This amendment is unnecessary; I hope that the noble Lord will not press it.

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[Lord Moylan (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly to Amendment 13 standing in my name. I can see the role of direct awards as a matter of principle in certain cases. They have the effect of removing from the process competition between potential bidders for a contract, but there are benefits to competition. I know the Minister wants me to imbibe and regurgitate great chunks of Lord Ashfield’s writings from the 1920s and 1930s, in which he could barely tolerate the word “competition” without using the adjective “wasteful”, but there are some benefits that might arise from competition that even the Minister might admit to.

I am willing to accept, if the Minister gives this assurance, that taking competition out of the process can be consistent with existing procurement legislation. He started to make that argument at Second Reading. I will not challenge him and say that this is contrary to procurement legislation—possibly it can be made compatible with procurement legislation, but he needs to explain how. However, I am concerned, in cases where there is more than one incumbent operator—which may well be the case, especially where local transport is for more geographically dispersed areas—about how a direct-award process might work in a way that was seen to be fair and did not expose the process to potentially awkward, difficult and unpleasant legal challenge and things of that character.

Essentially, I am trying to get more clarity from the Government about how direct awards will work in the more difficult and complex circumstances. I am seeking explicit assurances about the compatibility with procurement legislation, which I suspect the Minister can explain convincingly, but it needs to be put on the record.

[Lord Grayling (Con)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend’s comments. The difficulty with direct awards is that sometimes they are genuinely necessary. We experienced that on the railways—where circumstances change, a business fails or there is simply a need to take greater control for reasons that come along unexpectedly. The danger is—I go back to what I said earlier about ideology —that the requirement for a direct award caused by circumstance is overtaken by direct award driven by ideology.

I am afraid that that is at the heart of the noble Lord’s amendment. I understand the principle he represents, but it would not be right to have a situation in which a local authority was able, unfettered, to set up its own bus company and make a direct award to it, regardless of whether it was any good or not—there have been many occasions in history where the local municipal bus company has not been good at all.

In the world the Government seek to create, where in my view there is a role for direct award, on occasions, when it is necessary, I too would like to understand how the Minister would ensure that that power is used in a way that is right and proper, and, ultimately, as I said earlier, beneficial to the passenger.

[Baroness Pidgeon (LD)]

The amendments from the noble Lords, Lord Woodley and Lord Moylan, show both ends of the spectrum in this area—one wanting to make it easier for a local authority bus company to be directly awarded a service, and the other wanting the Secretary of State to be involved and lots of bureaucracy to make it even harder. But I absolutely agree that these amendments throw up some real questions around direct awards, and I hope the Minister can provide some clarity.

Direct awards can be made to existing operators where the post award services are deemed “substantially similar” in the context of direct awards. What criteria will be used to determine that? What is the precise definition of “substantially similar” services? How will the requirement for operators to take on real operational risk be defined and enforced under a direct award? As the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, has just rightly stated, in situations where multiple operators currently run services, what are the criteria for selecting an operator to receive a direct award? Will all existing operators be awarded a direct award? What guidance is going to be provided to local authorities regarding the structure of direct award contracts? What flexibility will they have in negotiating terms?

The bus industry welcomes this legislation but it will want some certainty. I hope the Minister can provide that in his response to this group of amendments.