Zero-emission Buses

Iain Stewart Excerpts

Tuesday 21st May 2024 Westminster Hall

[Iain Stewart (Milton Keynes South) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Rosindell. I congratulate the hon. Member for North Antrim (Ian Paisley) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Sir Robert Goodwill) on securing this important debate. I have worked on the subject of zero-emission buses for some time, both in my current role as Chairman of the Select Committee on Transport and in my previous guise as a Minister in the Scotland Office, when I had a number of dealings with Alexander Dennis in Falkirk.

I was particularly pleased when the Falkirk growth deal was agreed with Falkirk Council, the Scottish Government and local stakeholders. If memory serves me correctly, that included £10 million for a public transport net zero tech cluster that Alexander Dennis was closely involved in. This is a really important sector and I share the ambition of the hon. Member for North Antrim to have a vibrant zero-emission bus network, with the lion’s share manufactured by companies on these islands.

I want to put the issue in a slightly more balanced context. It is very easy to get into “Buy British” against “Buy overseas”. In reality, bus companies often work with each other. I am happy to be corrected if I am wrong, but I think Alexander Dennis, for example, has worked with BYD on part of the chassis. We have to be slightly more nuanced about what buying from a particular company means.

The hon. Member for North Antrim is absolutely right that we need fair competition. It is not in anyone’s interest to have an artificial purchase of buses, in whichever direction that is. It has to be good quality at a fair price. How that fair price is looked at is what matters; it is not just the headline price. I imagine bus showrooms are slightly different from car showrooms, but the sticker in the windscreen is not the full price. Wider issues have to be taken on board, such as the social value points the hon. Member identified.

The whole-life cost is important as well; this technology is still in nascent form. What does it mean when the bus comes to the end of its working life? Is there a second-hand market for it? What happens to the batteries, over what time? Those are important factors that need to be included when looking at the whole-life cost. If there are concerns about human rights, as the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) said, those also need to be factored into the equation.

Hidden subsidies may or may not be present. This example is not from the world of transport, but I have a company in my constituency that is world-leading in making industrial lifts, pickers and so on. At a recent event, the chairman of that company told me, “Our products are the best in the world.” He would say that, because they are. “But we are being undercut by competition from China.” Chinese products are good quality—perhaps not quite as good—but they are considerably cheaper. When the chairman asked how the competitor managed that, the reply was, “Our Government is very helpful to us.” The cost of running the factory there is significantly subsidised. That is the point I am making.

I want to see open and fair competition, so that world-leading British products can thrive fairly. The true costs have to be highlighted and be transparent, so that a local authority, or whoever, purchasing these vehicles has to show workings for the full cost of one bus against another. The point about fair competition was also made in a slightly different area of transport last week, when my Committee hosted a session on private electric vehicles. One of the questions I asked witnesses was: given that in the previous 24 hours President Biden’s Administration had announced tariffs for the import of Chinese-made electric vehicles and other products into the United States, should the UK and, indeed, Europe more widely consider such a tariff? I was somewhat surprised by the answer, as I thought there would be a demand for that. However, the witnesses said that no, many motor manufacturers do not want that. What they want is fair and open competition because that is what drives innovation, a better product and greater reliability and a better price for the customer. That is absolutely right, but it has to be on the basis of fair competition, looking at the costs in the round and not just the headline sales figure. I am not sure at this point exactly how we ensure that local authorities and others are obliged to look at that whole cost, but I hope the Minister will take that away and reflect on it.

The Government are right; they are putting a lot of money into zero-emission buses. The UK sector is world-leading and has enormous potential to become a major player both here and by exporting those buses overseas. However, I think we need to step back a little and look at the issue in the round. I hope today’s debate will help further that cause, and I once again thank the hon. Member for North Antrim for making the effort to secure it.