Severn Bridges

Daniel Zeichner Excerpts

Tuesday 31st January 2017 Westminster Hall

[Daniel Zeichner (Cambridge) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Newport East (Jessica Morden) on securing the debate. She has pursued this issue rigorously for years, and her contribution was once again principled and enlightening. I am sure that the people of Newport East and indeed Wales as a whole will have been pleased to hear their views so well represented. As we have heard, the Severn bridges tolls have a significant impact on their lives, their businesses and the wider economy of Wales.

I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Newport West (Paul Flynn) on a characteristically colourful contribution, which I am sure will echo down the airwaves. I have a vivid picture of him in his Mini trying to address the challenges of the Severn. My first car was a Riley Elf, which was a similar kind of vehicle. I am glad that we live in the 21st century. I enjoyed his account of the Rebecca riots, which I have not recalled since I was a history undergraduate. It all came back to me, and I am sure we will be able to use that in future debates, too.

Other hon. Members made powerful interventions. We heard important contributions about double taxation, the importance of listening to the staff who work on the bridge, which my hon. Friend the Member for Torfaen (Nick Thomas-Symonds) raised, and the sense of disadvantage that is felt in Wales.

This debate is timely. As has been explained, it is projected that Severn River Crossing plc will have generated the revenue that was originally agreed—£1.029 billion in July 1989 prices—by late 2017 or early 2018. The concession period is drawing to a close, the crossings will soon revert to public ownership, and now is exactly the right time to look again at the tolling regime, challenge it and change it.

As my hon. Friends have made clear today and on other occasions, many businesses in Wales believe that the Severn crossings tolls impede business activity across the bridges by deterring inward investment in Wales. The tolls, which are among the most expensive per distance travelled in the world, are a deterrent for small businesses hoping to operate in the south-west of England, for example. Hon. Friends have made the point about potential links with Bristol.

The Department for Transport is currently consulting on reducing the Severn crossings tolls and related issues. It proposes in its consultation document that tolls on all vehicles will be at least halved, while tolls on buses and small vans will be reduced by more than 75%. We would welcome a reduction in tolls, which would particularly benefit small business owners using small vans, and we would also welcome VAT no longer applying. The Department also proposes to replace the existing legislation with a charging order and replace tolls with charges, which would make them easier to reduce. Other options under consideration include the introduction of a free-flow electronic charging system, the levying of charges in both directions rather than a charge being applied to only westbound traffic, and the removal of charges at night.

The Department for Transport has said that the crossings cost approximately £15 million per annum to operate and maintain. The Government have also stated that they need to recover costs of £63 million from work that they funded to address the original bridge’s latent defects, such as corrosion of the suspension cables. But as has been pointed out, similar debt was written off for the Humber crossing, so why not for this one? That work has already been paid for through general taxation, and people entering Wales should not be forced to pay for prior expenditure associated with the Severn bridges. The Welsh Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Infrastructure pointed that out, and also said that

“the tolls should be removed at the earliest opportunity, alleviating the burden on the economy and removing the significant threat they represent to trade in a post-Brexit world.”

Indeed, the National Assembly for Wales last year voted for the Severn tolls to be abolished, but the power to do so is not in the Welsh Government’s remit. In 2010, the Welsh Affairs Committee recommended that the charge be reduced to a maintenance-only toll, which, as we have heard, would stand at around £1.50. Neither option is being consulted on.

The Department for Transport says:

“The Severn Crossings are a key link in the economies of South Wales and the South West of England, and continue to foster the economic and cultural landscape of their surrounding areas.”

That is quite true, but why does the Department not therefore look at the research commissioned by the Welsh Government that suggests that removing the tolls could boost the south Wales economy by more than £100 million a year? Although it is encouraging that the Department proposes reducing the charges and keeping them under review to see whether they can be reduced further, we believe that all options should be considered and be part of the consultation.

We are pleased that the Government are consulting on the introduction of free-flow toll technology on the Severn crossings—that could help to reduce congestion, which is projected to grow—but that needs to be introduced at the earliest opportunity. We saw how long it took even to implement card payments at the crossings. It is also worth pointing out that congestion management problems should not be dealt with simply by maintaining charges that will deter people from using the crossings. The Government also said in their consultation that charges would be used only for maintenance and operation of the bridges. Will the Minister confirm that no profit will be made from the new charges and that they will not be used for general revenue generation for the Treasury?

The Severn bridges are of strategic significance to Wales. At a time when the UK faces economic uncertainty in the light of the vote to leave the European Union, I am sure the Minister has listened intently to the hon. Members here today. They have made their points well and they know best what should be done to promote the Welsh economy both at home and abroad when the crossings return to public ownership.