Bus Services (No. 2) Bill [HL]

Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 13th February 2025 Grand Committee

Those points are not very exciting in themselves; they are three fairly common-sense points—and, as I say, there are others that noble Lords might wish to add. But a sense of direction from the Government about where their guidance will take us is really important. As with the railways, “Trust us” should not be enough for this Committee.

[The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill) (Lab)]

My Lords, Amendment 49 in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady Pidgeon and Lady Grey-Thompson, and the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, and Amendment 78 tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, seek to place a statutory requirement on reviewing the Bill’s impact on rural areas and villages. I also heard clearly the point from the right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans—and, incidentally, I agree with him about the need for cross-subsidy to help bus routes that are not in themselves profitable.

I note and understand the importance of serving villages and rural areas. Indeed, the Government intend the choices available to local transport authorities in the Bill to address just those points—including, for the avoidance of doubt, as we discussed this on a previous day, the appropriate use of demand-responsive transport.

The monitoring and evaluation of the Bill, which include the impact on rural services, will be completed as part of a wider evidence review of bus franchising. It will take several years—up to five years—for local authorities to transition to a franchised network or to form local authority bus companies, so any review prior to this would not be able to consider the full impact of any such transition. I listened very carefully to the noble Lord, Lord Burns, and I have very high regard for the work that he did in both south Wales and north Wales; he made elegantly that very point. In addition, the full impact of franchising is not expected to be seen until franchising schemes have been operating for some time. Therefore, the timing of a full assessment of impacts on local services needs to reflect that timeline.

I say to my noble friend Lord Snape that while a dose of realism is always a good thing in a discussion about the future, the evidence from the stages of franchising in Manchester is that a remarkable change in both the reliability of the bus service and the volumes of patronage and revenue has been seen as a consequence of the introduction of franchising in various phases.

[Lord Snape (Lab)]

I respectfully point out that Manchester is scarcely a rural area, and the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, specifies rural areas. It might be a bit more difficult to run cross-country services in rural areas than it is to run a franchising operation in cities such as Greater Manchester.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

Indeed. I am grateful to my noble friend for that observation. I should have also mentioned the situation in Cornwall, which is more or less franchising and in an area that can be called rural, where the consequence of a decent set of organised services in a rural area has been a considerable increase in patronage. My noble friend’s point about realism is right, and I think the real point of what he was saying is that these things take some time to mature and come into effect.

On rural areas, there is no doubt that considerable damage has been done to public transport by an approach necessitated by the previous Government’s funding mechanisms, which have reintroduced routes that were withdrawn, withdrawn again routes that were reintroduced and given a lack of continuity to services that need it in order for people to rely on them.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, for bringing forward Amendment 53 about statutory changes to local council powers. The Government believe that such changes will be wholly beneficial to communities in the United Kingdom. There may be legislation in this Session that alters the powers of local councils to provide them further powers on transport. Given the proximity in timing of any such legislation to this Bill, it would not be appropriate to provide such a review, as the powers would not have had sufficient time to be in force.

I appreciate that this Bill and the English devolution Bill, as well as the forthcoming railway reform Bill, will or may have related provisions to enhance the role of local councils, and we will work closely across and between departments to ensure that they most effectively give local councils control over their own transport networks. In respect of buses, the extensive guidance already available on enhanced partnerships in franchising from government, and the Bus Centre of Excellence, which has been referred to previously, will be available.

Amendment 62 in the name of my noble friend Lord Berkeley would introduce a statutory requirement for the Secretary of State to review within six months the Bill’s impact on certain local transport services. I refer to the remarks I have already made about the length of time it would take to take a good view about changes. I know that my noble friend is a long-standing campaigner on ferry services and the important role they play in connecting communities. I also note his description of the ferry service to the Isles of Scilly as “bumpy”, which is undoubtedly true. I agree that these services provide a crucial lifeline for many communities and ensure that people can access essential services, as he says.

The noble Lord also asked at Second Reading about tram services. Again, they are an important part. However, the meaning of this Bill is clear: it is focused on the provision of local bus services and a tram is clearly not a bus—a ferry is even less so. On ferries, though, I understand that the Isles of Scilly Council has been in touch with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government regarding both this matter and broader support for the islands. I hope that the noble Lord will note that I have said that.

Turning to Amendment 73, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, and the noble Earl, Lord Effingham, for bringing it forward. The Committee will have heard the noble Lord’s remarks about the handling of passenger complaints. The Government remain committed to ensuring that services are continuously improved with passengers. This amendment is consistent with our approach to rail, for which guidance on how to resolve complaints already exists. I agree with the noble Lords that it is important to deal with complaints properly, but it is my view that, apart from the handling of the original complaint, the resolution role sits with passenger watchdogs. The department is in the process of undertaking work with existing passenger watchdogs—Transport Focus and London TravelWatch—and bus stakeholders to identify issues and make recommendations on embedding standardised complaint-handling processes, ensuring that passengers have clear escalation. I agree wholeheartedly with the noble Lord that the way to deal with complaints is not to file them in the waste-paper basket, but I do not wish to cut across the engagement that is currently under way.

I shall now address the points from the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, about help for local transport authorities in route planning and fare setting. Of course, he has missed the fact that virtually every local transport authority in Britain has existing experience in both since, for the past 40 years, they have had to tender services that have not been found by commercial bus services to be worth running. I cannot believe that there is a local transport authority in the country that does not have some experience of both route planning and fare setting.

Amendment 79B in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, seeks to impose new requirements on the provision of real-time passenger information. I absolutely agree with the noble Lord that ensuring that passengers can access high-quality, real-time information about their services is critical, but he will, I hope, be aware that there are existing obligations on bus operators. The Public Service Vehicles (Open Data) (England) Regulations 2020 provide the foundation for those obligations and, from these regulations, the Bus Open Data Service was launched in 2020 to facilitate the provision of high-quality, accurate and up-to-date passenger information across England, outside London. The Government will continue to work with local authorities and the sector to help drive improvements in real-time information.

I know that the noble Lord will have noted the part of our earlier discussion about the requirement in this Bill to ensure that real-time information is available on an accurate basis; the worst thing you can have is inaccurate real-time information. However, this Bill is also about empowering local areas. Part of that is trusting them to take decisions on what is best for the communities that they serve and working with them constructively, particularly in areas where there are existing regulations to ensure that services are improved. This is why I believe that the noble Lord’s Amendment 79B is not necessary.

Turning to Amendment 79D, again I thank the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, for bringing it forward. As he said, it is about working with local transport authorities and airport operators, but I do not believe that the amendment is necessary. My department is currently carrying out a call for ideas for the integrated national transport strategy, which will set out a single national vision. This will have people who use transport and their needs at its heart and will empower local leaders to develop integrated transport solutions. As part of the Bill, we want better links across modes—links that connect people and businesses and support the economy. We are working with operators, local authorities and passengers in that way to deliver more reliable public transport networks in general. The noble Lord will, I hope, understand that I do not wish to cut across the engagement on the integrated national transport strategy that is currently under way.

[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

I am grateful to my noble friend the Minister for his remarks in response to my amendment. He said in passing that a tram is not a bus, which is of course true, but it often fulfils the same role as a bus by moving lots of people in relative comfort. A lightweight tram scheme is now being built in Coventry, which I hope will be working in the next few years. It is very much cheaper to build, which is excellent, because it needs lighter track work. However, the question of who decides the timetable and fares of that tram and any bus service that Coventry City Council might wish to encourage will need looking at in future. Has the Minister’s department thought about that?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I thank my noble friend for his intervention. First, the ultra-light tram development in Coventry is still a tram—it has steel wheels on steel rails, so it is still a tram. Secondly, all those schemes, even ones that will, I hope, produce a relative reduction in capital cost, have to be considered through the Transport and Works Act orders and other mechanisms for building infrastructure. The consequence of that is that those schemes are generally under the control of public authorities and are almost always in urban areas. One of the consequences of the freedoms that this Bill will give to local transport authorities will be the introduction of franchising, binding together all the public transport services in those conurbations, including both timetables and fares, to give an integrated service to citizens who live in those towns and cities.

[Baroness Pidgeon (LD)]

The Minister has clearly heard the strength of feeling from across the Committee about rural communities and the importance of connectivity and access to bus services. The comments of the noble Lord, Lord Snape, about funding are important, because funding is always the elephant in the room. But what we are discussing are new measures, including franchising, which will be the new tool to help local government and local transport authorities to address some of these socially necessary routes—not profitable routes—as part of bus route packages. Our amendments simply try to improve this legislation; we are very supportive, overall, of its aims. I am reassured to have heard from the Minister about this wider review and ensuring that rural communities and areas are part of that, so I am happy to withdraw my amendment.

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What my noble friend Lord Effingham is suggesting is a very relevant exercise. The Government are changing the bus fare cap from £2 to £3. I think everyone would agree that it is a significant change—a 50% uplift—and my noble friend is calling for a proper study of that. It would give us a case study of what is happening in the next few months, in real time. If we do not take advantage of such opportunities, where we see dramatic shifts in fare levels that we can time and study before and after, we will not learn what we want to know about the effect of fares on passenger demand. The noble Lord, Lord Snape, suggests that it is not a priority for passengers and that there are other, more important things. He has experience and he may be right, but other studies may show that it really is determinative. This is one thing that the Minister should agree to, because we could all learn a great deal from it, and these difficult discussions for politicians would be very much better informed.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

My Lords, Amendment 51 tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, would require local transport authorities to review the impact of bus fares on patronage. Where a local transport authority has delivered fare interventions to encourage patronage, such as Cornwall’s bus fares pilot and the West Yorkshire Combined Authority Mayor’s fare intervention, they have already commissioned independent evaluation reports to measure their success. Bus service improvement plans already in place also include measures addressing bus fares to encourage greater use of buses. We must recognise that changes to fares are usually delivered at the same time as other transport interventions that support and improve bus services. It would therefore be challenging to attribute any change in patronage solely to a change in the fare charged to passengers.

Your Lordships will have noted that the Government are in the process of negotiating the outcomes for which local transport authorities will be held accountable in respect of buses, as part of their recent respective comprehensive funding settlements. In addition to outcome monitoring at a local level, we will continue to monitor fare impacts at a national level to inform future fare cap decisions.

In passing, I note the noble Baroness’s observations about whether Shropshire adopted the £2 fare cap. I am informed that all except six bus services in Shropshire were covered, although I would not say that the bus network in Shropshire was either adequate or satisfactory. One of the effects of the Bill, when it becomes an Act, will be to enable local transport authorities to do better by the various means embraced within it. I therefore submit that the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, is unnecessary because of the actions already taking place.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, and the noble Earl, Lord Effingham, for Amendment 63, which seeks to examine the impact of ending the £2 national bus fare cap. The department has prepared a full monitoring and evaluation report of the £2 national bus fare cap, which has just been published. The report is available to read and I will make sure that noble Lords present have the link to it. It suggests that urban populations are more likely to have used the scheme, where of course journeys are shorter and fares are more likely to be £2 or less. In fact, the average fare payable on buses prior to the scheme’s introduction was between £2 and £3. The Government’s adoption of a £3 cap, and the added safeguard of increases above £2 being limited to the rate of inflation, do a great deal, at the cost of £150 million, to continue to ensure that millions can access better opportunities and get greater bus use.

[Lord Moylan (Con)]

A study of the effect of the £2 bus cap would be very valuable—let us remember that the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, said that in her rural part of Dorset it was transformative; I think that was the word she used about it having a significant effect in that part of the world—and we look forward to reading it. But my noble friend Lord Effingham was also asking for a study of what the effect of increasing it would be when that is introduced, which would be equally valuable and show the other part of the equation, if noble Lords see what I mean. I press the Minister because I do not want him to miss the point inadvertently. Is a similar study of the effect of increasing the cap to £3 after an appropriate period—six months or a year—something to which he can commit himself today to illuminate that picture for us?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for that. I will certainly think about whether, and at what stage, the department would look at that further. I am certainly not going to commit to it today, because we are looking at wide-ranging legislation about bus services in general, but I wanted to inform the Committee that the work on the £2 bus fare cap is now published.

Amendments 74 and 80 from the noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, also concern the £2 bus fare cap, which I have just addressed. They are clearly intended to seek its reintroduction. Bearing in mind what the average bus fare is, that the Government are proposing to continue with a £3 cap and that fares between £2 and £3 will go up only by the rate of inflation, I hope she will agree that those amendments are unnecessary. However, the noble Baroness referred to the wider retailing of bus tickets, which is obviously a good idea; from time to time, I find myself agreeing with the noble Lord, Lord Moylan. Access to bus services should be widely available, and not understanding the fare structure or being able to buy a bus ticket are the worst reasons for not using the service.

In my view, and in the Government’s view, the provisions in this Bill that allow local transport authorities a choice of enhanced partnerships or franchising, or even their own bus companies, will enable local transport authorities to look at wider retailing. Of course, the ultimate aim is not to sell bus tickets at all but for people to use credit cards or bank cards directly as means of payment. We want the bus industry and bus services to move towards that, and I believe that this Bill will facilitate it.

Amendment 77 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, looks for a review of the English national concessionary travel scheme. The Government want everybody who needs it to have access to public transport and are committed to improving the system. The English national concessionary travel scheme costs about £700 million annually, and any changes to the statutory obligations, such as the hours in which the pass can be used being extended, would need to be carefully considered. As I said to the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, on a previous occasion in the Chamber, the Government are not considering changes to the scheme at the moment.

However, local authorities in England already have the power to offer concessions in addition to their statutory obligations. We see this in London, where individuals aged 60 and over are eligible for the 60+ Oyster card, and similar schemes already exist in other parts of the country, where local authorities have chosen to provide specific support to their communities through offers that go beyond their statutory obligation. That ability for local transport authorities will continue, and no part of this Bill will restrict it. A review into the English national concessionary travel scheme concluded in 2024, and my department is currently considering the next steps.

Amendment 79 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, would require the Secretary of State to review the impact of making buses free for children. The Government remain committed to exploring targeted solutions that deliver value for money to taxpayers while ensuring affordable bus travel for those who need it most, particularly young people. Bus operators can choose to offer concessions to children and young people. In fact, youth concessions are currently offered by at least one commercial bus operator in 73 out of the 85 local authority areas in England outside London. Local authorities also have powers to introduce concessions or discounts for young people. Since buses are local and the Government are committed to devolution, that is where we believe that such choices should be made in respect of free and reduced-rate travel for children.

Finally, I note the observations by the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, about demanding or wanting reports following my noble friend Lord Snape’s helpful intervention. This Bill has been carefully thought through. The first requirement when it becomes an Act of Parliament will be that it works for local authorities, communities and bus passengers. No doubt there will be reports in due course but, frankly, I am not looking for any of them to be carried out now or in the immediate future because, as my noble friend observed, our efforts ought to be concentrated on running the bus service better rather than writing reports about why it does not work.

[Baroness Pidgeon (LD)]

I thank the Minister. I am reassured by him saying that the Government ought to continue to monitor the fare impact at a national level and will circulate the link to the review of the £2 cap. That is to be welcomed. I hope that he will drive forward the point about ticketing and modernisation because it is important for passengers.

However, I go back to the comments that I made earlier. The hefty report that I have here, the final-stage impact assessment, says:

“There may also be benefits associated with increasing bus usage through lowering fares”.


We have heard today about Cornwall’s hugely successful pilot but, if you read the trade press, it is clear that there are concerns about it continuing, and this goes back to the funding point that we discussed earlier. Probably for the first time in this Committee, I strongly disagree with the Minister about the £2 bus cap. We think that it is essential. The Minister described my amendment as unnecessary. We do not agree with that, we think that it is very necessary, but, at this stage, I will withdraw it. I am sure that we will come back to it at a future stage. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

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[Lord Moylan (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to those who have spoken in this short debate. I have great sympathy with what the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, said, as she knows. We will support her in her continuing campaign, and that of the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, and my noble friend Lord Holmes of Richmond, to put the case on behalf of disabled people for proper consideration in relation to public transport services.

I was mildly tickled by the proposal from the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock. One of my deep concerns, which I have tried to express in as gentle a way as possible throughout this Committee, has been the adequacy and competence of local councillors to take on the role envisaged for them by this Bill. I had not imagined that a vice-chairman of the LGA should give such ringing endorsement to my concerns, to the point where she actually said that training should be mandated by statute for those who will take part in making those decisions. We are at one on this in our concern.

None the less, I am not entirely sure—here I suspect that I will sound a bit like the Minister, and I speak as a former local councillor—that the idea of a statutory training programme in this area would be appropriate. There is a false analogy with training for the exercise of planning and licensing functions, because those are almost invariably what are referred to as quasi-judicial functions that relate to individuals making applications relating to their property, business, premises or whatever. They need to be taken in an appropriate legal framework, rather than a political framework. It is appropriate that councillors are given training in that legal background where they are called on to make those decisions.

The sort of decisions that will be made here are not in that category, so I wonder whether this approach is necessary. In fact, even it were appropriate to have statutory training, I would not have training on the provisions of this Bill, which is what the amendment calls for but, rather, training of the sort that perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Snape, could provide: training in how to run a bus company and make the hard, crunchy decisions that you will be confronted with about how to manage your resources in a way that maximises your revenue while allowing you to provide as many, but not necessarily all, of the socially important services that you would like to provide. Those are the hard, crunchy things that people will need to be trained in, rather than understanding the legal background provided by this Bill.

In a way, I am delighted to find myself holding hands with the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, on this topic, but I am not sure that I can support her on the wording of this amendment.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

My Lords, I will address Amendments 54 and 55 together. I listened carefully, as I hope that I always do, to the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, who talked about her real experience of travelling by bus. Anything less than 100% accessibility is unacceptable, and I completely agree with her.

The Government are determined that power over local bus services is put back in the hands of local leaders across England. That is why the department recently allocated over £700 million of bus grant for local transport authorities in 2025-26 by formula. Funding for bus services is also provided through the local government finance settlement. In fact, specifically, the 2025-26 funding included money for additional officer capability, for either additional officers or help equivalent to additional officers, to help each local transport authority in the choices that this Bill will give them.

The Government have also established the Bus Centre of Excellence, which I am sure we will continue to return to. Work is also under way to provide even more active support to local transport authorities that wish to explore franchising. I take this opportunity to make noble Lords aware of the Government’s plans to pilot different franchising models particularly suited to more rural areas. This funding, along with potential local transport authority bus funding in future financial years, is available to support implementation of the Bill’s measures.

It is, of course, wholly reasonable to expect the people who deliver policies and support services that help disabled people to understand their legal rights, needs and expectations. This afternoon, we will come on to the primary training needs of bus drivers, who are the visible front line of the bus service. The Government are clearly committed to helping authorities deliver the service improvements that we all want to see, whether it is through tailored assistance, the additional funding to which I have referred or the Bus Centre of Excellence.

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[Lord Moylan (Con)]

My Lords, with his amendments, the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, has opened up one of the most important and least discussed areas to do with bus operations in a way that presents many of us who have experience of responsibility, one way or another, for bus services—in my case, a non-executive responsibility for a number of years—with real challenges and difficulty. The question we must ask ourselves is whether bus operators have the right mentality about safety. I say that in the light of what has been achieved in the construction industry, for example, over the past 20 years, where a focus on zero accidents and injuries has transformed the way of working. Of course, zero is never quite achieved, but very close to zero is now achieved on construction sites. A deliberate programme and a deliberate change in mentality has brought that about. On the railways, there is a strong focus on that mentality, and I wonder whether it exists on the buses: are we, in fact, way out of date in our attitudes towards safety?

I want to mention that I have just become an officer of the newly reconstituted APPG on Women in Transport. The relevance is that many of these issues to do with safety are women’s issues. There is the obvious question of violence against women and girls on buses; the APPG will look at that, but there is the broader issue of safety in general. I do not have up-to-date statistics, but it used to be the case, admittedly some years ago, that a very large percentage of women over the age of 65 presenting at A&E were there because they had suffered an injury inside a bus—not from a bus collision but inside a bus, very often because of aggressive or inappropriate braking on modern buses, which have very sharp brakes. The safety regulators, of course, think, “Yes, we must have the sharpest and most modern brakes, just as for a motor car”, but in a motor car you are sitting down and strapped in, whereas on a bus you are frequently standing up, because buses are designed to carry standing passengers. Sharp braking results in people falling over. Very often, proportionally, it is elderly women who are falling over and being injured. Do we take proper account of that? Are we recording it? Are we thinking actively about what we should do about it? The situation has not improved in the 20 years or so that I have been making this point about elderly women inside buses.

Then there is the question, which is very pertinent to the Bill, of the way in which franchise contracts operate. My experience is somewhat out of date, but it is a London-based experience where franchising is used, and to some extent the London model is the basis for the Bill and is being rolled out elsewhere. The emphasis in the contracts is on keeping to the timetable, and that is very difficult in urban areas because of congestion and unpredictable events, including roadworks and so forth. Very often, drivers are under pressure—they have a clock and are in direct communication with their control—to make up time because gaps in the service have arisen, and they can do that only by going faster and braking more sharply. Quite apart from the potential effects on passengers inside the bus, which I have already mentioned, the risk of knocking into something, often with very serious effect if that something happens to be a human body walking in the street, is increased.

We are all here saying how wonderful it is—not all of us are saying it with the same level of enthusiasm, admittedly, but there are people in the Room saying how wonderful it is—that we are extending a franchise model, but the structure of the contract on which those franchises will be based needs to be looked at carefully in the light of safety considerations. We should all be very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, for bringing up this issue.

In relation to Amendment 60, I am not persuaded that we should have a new and separate statutory provision about working time in the Bill, when we already have quite extensive and elaborate working time legislation elsewhere. There is a lot to be said in favour of Amendments 58 and 59. I have a suspicion that they will reappear on Report; if they do, they will deserve very serious consideration indeed.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb and Lady Pidgeon, for Amendment 58. It seeks to require local authorities to ensure that bus operators provide their drivers with access to the Confidential Incident Reporting and Analysis System, which I will refer to as CIRAS.

The Government are always concerned, as they should be, about any safety incidents in the bus sector, or indeed any other public transport sector. That is why a number of official routes exist to allow anyone to provide confidential, anonymous reporting on safety and standards in the sector, backed up by enforcement. Anyone may anonymously report a lack of safety or conformation to standards in the bus sector to the DVSA intelligence unit, which may use this information to investigate the situation, including by working with other government departments and agencies, as well as police forces.

Comprehensive standards bridge all aspects of bus operation, across the roadworthiness of vehicles, operation of services and driver standards. As I said, they are enforced by a number of organisations, principally the DVSA. The operators of the vehicles are licensed by the traffic commissioners, who consider non-compliance issues seriously and ensure that operators are effectively regulated. The judicial process of the traffic commissioners can and does result in depriving people of operators’ licences and depriving managers of their certificate to run bus operations.

CIRAS provides another route for employees to report concerns. Both Transport for London and Transport for Greater Manchester are members of CIRAS. Being able to report such concerns in a confidential manner is clearly important, and I would encourage employees of member organisations to consider using this service where appropriate. But CIRAS is a third-party service, and it would not be appropriate to include it within the scope of the Bill.

However, I did a bit of personal research on this, and I will say that if we are asking people to report bus safety issues to the DVSA intelligence unit, it would make a lot of sense for access to it to be freely available. When I looked at it, it was quite difficult to find, which is really unhelpful, so I commit that we will see what needs to be done to make sure that the route to report directly to the government agency responsible for safety on buses is as efficient and easy as possible.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, for bringing forward Amendment 59. Road safety is a priority for the Government, of course, and we expect bus operators, as I hope I have just said, to adhere to the highest standards of safety. Buses are one of the safest modes of road transport in Great Britain, and my department remains committed to improving safety with appropriate vehicle construction standards and ensuring the safe operation of vehicles. As we have heard, franchising authorities report safety in detail, and I expect that a consequence of this Bill, as it enables other franchising authorities to be established, will be to enable them to report safety in a similar way to how London and Manchester already do. In effect, the franchising authority is taking responsibility for procuring and delivering a bus service.

In respect of operations that are not part of franchise bus services, we have heard this afternoon that this is carried out through the STATS19 framework, which relies on reports from the police. These reports are based on locations identified by geographical co-ordinates. This is a role that cannot be delegated to local transport authorities and ought to stay with the Driver & Vehicle Standards Agency because it relates to PSV operator licensing requirements. However, I note the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, in respect of accidents away from public roads, which I will go away and have a close look at. I am not familiar with that nuance, but it is clearly important. Trying to divide any sorts of accidents into fault and no fault is fraught with difficulty. In fact, it must be subjective, and therefore I am not sure that we would want to go down that road. I understand his point about recording accidents on public service vehicles wherever they occur, and I will go away and see what can be done about that.

Amendment 60 from the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, seeks to change long-established rules about daily driving time on regular bus services. There are two sorts of driving time rules: one for services that do not go beyond 50 kilometres and one for services that do. These daily limits are well and long established, and I think the gist of my conversation with the noble Lord was that he was looking for an ability for people to report scheduling requirements on bus drivers that make drivers feel that they are not safe. That is a matter that could well be drawn to the attention of the DVSA because it goes to the heart of the repute of the operator. I understand that there may well be drivers who feel that what they are being asked to do is potentially or actually unsafe. That goes back to the process that I have referred to and the ability to report it to either CIRAS, if the people responsible for the operation are members of it, or the DVSA if they are not. I note what he said about this amendment seeking to draw to our attention this important matter.

The noble Lords, Lord Hampton and Lord Moylan, talked about the timetable. No bus timetable in Britain should have any requirement for people to drive unsafely or exceed the speed limit. As a seasoned operator with some background in this, I say to them that very often, certainly in urban areas, what you are in fact looking for is not the timetable to be operated but the reliability of the bus service to be as good as it can be. My experience is that drivers should not feel under pressure to return to the timetable. In many cases, any substantial delay makes that impossible. The training given to bus drivers is about driving safely, having absolute regard to the safety of passengers and, in practice, maintaining the regularity of the service rather than the timetable.

If there are cases where drivers feel that they are being asked to drive unsafely, either by schedule or in practice, it is the reporting mechanism that we need to address because there are people trained in this stuff who can address those issues.

[Lord Moylan (Con)]

With the Minister’s permission, I do not think that we are disagreeing and, therefore, I do not think that what he just said about timetables is quite the answer to my point. It may be my fault for expressing it in the way I did. I am sure that I talked about adhering to the timetable—I will look back at it—but he has cast it differently. He said that reliability—that is, the frequency between buses arriving—is what operators seek to maintain, but that is precisely what can lead to the sort of pressure on drivers where a controller says, “Hurry up because the gap between you and the bus ahead has got too large”. That is really what I was talking about and what I meant to express, although I used the language of timetabling.

The key question that the Minister will need to address is to what extent does the contract reward that behaviour? To what extent is reliability rewarded in the contract? In many cases, companies and people behave according to financial incentives. If your narrow margins as a bus operator or a franchise depend on maintaining certain levels of reliability and certain gaps between buses along the service, that is what you will be pushing your staff to do. It comes back to this question of what the contract says and what it rewards.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for his intervention. Before I got to the railway, I spent most of my adult life trying to encourage people who control bus services not to rely on the timetable but to adhere to a regular frequency. Of course, the truth is that in most urban areas, once you have lost time, the chances of ever regaining it are, frankly, pretty small, and they are even smaller with the increasing use of speed limits of 20 miles per hour. I take the noble Lord’s point but, in the end, this is about people either being required to drive unsafely or believing that they are required to do so. It is certainly possible, and I have seen it done to encourage people to attempt to make time up but, in my experience over the 50 years I have been driving buses—now and again, more recently—it is very difficult to do so.

Let us go back to the safety aspect of this. Where the noble Lord, Lord Hampton, is going rightly concerns finding a way for bus drivers to express that they are being either expected to drive unsafely or encouraged to do it. I take his point about that very clearly. As I said before, there are all these requirements on franchised authorities, which will report on safety because they are procuring the service. CIRAS is available, where people have chosen to join that third-party organisation, but, where they have not done so, it is about making the route to complaining clearer and more available. I very much hope that that answers the noble Lord’s points. I will leave it there.

[Lord Hampton (CB)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who took part in this debate. I genuinely thought that this was this place at its best, and I realise that I have trespassed on a landscape of real expertise, but I think we got some cross-party consensus that we really need to push safety to the front of the Bill if it is not there already. I think the implication was there, but it is not in the Bill. The noble Lord, Lord Moylan, talked about zero injuries in the construction industry which was very interesting, and we need to take that on board. Once again, we have got back to this: we need a really good reporting mechanism that people can use, and we need to publish what data is coming out as much as possible. I trust the Minister when he says that he will go away and think about this a lot. In that case, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

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[Lord Burns (CB)]

My Lords, can I use this opportunity to point out that one of the great benefits of the contactless system is the ability to have integrated fares across a region? One of the things that I discovered in North Wales was the frustration of many people—again, particularly in rural areas—when they were taking several journeys to get to their destination. The ability to have this all taken care of within one transaction is of enormous benefit. Of course, as we know from London, it gives also you the opportunity to have daily caps on the prices of tickets and a great deal of improvement in the experience of people who are making complicated journeys, often across different modes but certainly across different bus journeys.

I see this as an important part of the future. If we are to have an integrated public transport system, we need an integrated fare structure as well. The contactless system is an important step on the way to achieving that important part of the pricing mechanism for the future. Despite the issue that we heard about earlier in terms of the £2 fare cap, my own view is that having an integrated system of the kind we enjoy in London is one of the most important things for the future usage of buses.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I thank the noble Earl, Lord Effingham, and the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, for their amendments; I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Burns, for his remarks just now. The Government know how important affordable and reliable bus services are in enabling people to access education, work and vital services. We also know that buses are particularly important for people in the lowest-income households, who make nearly twice as many bus trips as the average, and for younger people, who are much more likely to use buses than other age groups.

The Government also understand the importance of making payment methods on buses accessible and available to all. This is why we have provided guidance to local transport authorities and bus operators on developing their bus service improvement plans, which encourages both parties to work in partnership on improving the provision of fares and ticketing to ensure that the needs of all local bus users are taken into account. To this end, local transport authorities are also encouraged to capture local information about cash usage and electronic payments to inform the development of their bus service improvement plans. The bus franchising powers in the Bill will also give local authorities greater control over fares and ticketing while, through their enhanced partnership arrangements, they can work closely with bus operators to ensure that fares and ticketing policies are inclusive for passengers.

I should just add that, from my own experience as the person who was at the time responsible for the removal of cash payments from buses in London, contrary to the belief of the then mayor that it was the poorest people in London who habitually paid cash, it was completely the reverse: the poorest people in London had already worked out the value of Oyster cards and of daily, weekly and monthly ticketing. In fact, it was the ABC1 males who insisted on trying to pay the enhanced cash fare. When we withdrew it, they immediately moved to Oyster cards themselves. We have already discussed better ticketing once this afternoon, of course.

Amendment 71 looks to have integrated ticketing across the bus network; I note that the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, largely took Amendments 71 and 72 together. His sentiments are right: it is good for passengers, as well as for the bus network, its operators and franchising authorities, to have the most modern methods of payment with the lowest possible transaction costs. I completely agree with him.

What we do not want is to try to force people to do things that they cannot currently do while the work in progress that the noble Earl described is going on, to make payment methods as easy as possible. He asked me for a timetable, which I am not sure I can give him, but the multiplicity of back offices across the bus and railway networks in Britain needs to be untangled, and substantial work is going on within the department to enable multimodal ticketing, particularly in Manchester and the West Midlands, outside London. The consequence of that will be—I hope in time, and as quickly as possible—to allow the back office, in the way that he wants and as the noble Lord, Lord Burns, described, to provide seamless ticketing across bus networks. That work continues, and will take some time. He is, of course, right that in London the volume of transactions was so great that the credit card companies were willing to come to the table very easily. Outside London, it is a bit different, but the department is working very hard to do it.

Since the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, rightly says that the Government are moving quite well in that direction—and he also observes, as I can confirm from observation just now, that the English national concessionary pass has the English rose on it, because mine has it on—I submit, on his own assurance that the Government are moving quite fast, that neither amendment is necessary.

[The Earl of Effingham (Con)]

I thank my noble friend Lord Moylan, the noble Lord, Lord Burns, and the Minister, who have all contributed to this short debate. It really is critical that we ensure financial inclusion for everyone. Based on what the Minister has just said, we will look at this issue further, but for now I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

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[Lord Moylan (Con)]

My Lords, I heartily endorse the comments made by my noble friend Lord Effingham and the support given by the noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon. To be crystal clear, the fundamental issue is not the increase in national insurance rates as such, but the reduction in the threshold at which national insurance becomes payable.

Many of the people who drive special educational needs buses are part-time semi-volunteers. They may be working a few hours in the morning and a few hours in the afternoon, and their overall salary, as things currently stand, brings them in below the level at which national insurance contributions are payable. That is approximately £10,000 a year; I am using a very rough figure there, as I do not have the actual figures at hand. The Government’s proposal is a reduction to £5,000 a year of the point at which national insurance contributions become payable—again, an approximate figure. It is that reduction which brings these people within scope of national insurance contributions, which is potentially fatal to the operation of many of these services. They will simply not continue. The best that can be hoped for would be a more expensive service, after a lengthy period of retendering and disruption, in which maybe the same or maybe different operators are providing a more expensive service to the local education authority in many cases.

Separately, there is also the question of private schools and putting VAT on the bus services they provide, which would be bizarre because no other form of transport is subject to VAT, as far as I am aware. It is one of the consequences of the Government’s vindictive action against private schools. But the SEND issue is not simply about private schools; it is about the whole range of schools, and it is crucial that it is resolved soon.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

Before I address the amendments in this group in turn, I wish to say that I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, the noble Earl, Lord Effingham, and the noble Baronesses, Lady Pidgeon and Lady Harris of Richmond—who raised her concerns at Second Reading—for raising the importance of home-to-school travel for children with special educational needs. Although this is not directly within my department, my officials continue to work with the Department for Education to understand the issues and how they are best addressed. No child should struggle to get to school because of a lack of suitable transport.

Your Lordships may already be aware that the Government are clear that the system for educating children with special educational needs and disability—SEND—requires reform. The Department for Education will work with families, schools, local authorities and other partners to deliver improvements so that children and young people can access the support that they deserve. It acknowledges that challenges in the SEND system extend to the arrangements for home-to-school travel and has committed to ensuring that more children can receive the support they need in a local mainstream school. This will mean fewer children needing to rely on long and complex journeys to access education.

Turning to Amendment 65, home-to-school transport is the responsibility of local authorities with education functions, not local transport authorities. For example, Transport for Greater Manchester is the local transport authority for the Greater Manchester region but responsibility for home-to-school travel rests with the 10 local councils within the region. The Education Act 1996 places a statutory duty on local authorities to arrange free home-to-school travel for eligible children. A child is eligible if they are of compulsory school age, attend their nearest suitable school and would not be able to walk there because of the distance, their special educational needs, a disability, a mobility problem, or because the route is not safe.

It is for local authorities to decide what travel arrangements they make for eligible children. For example, they might provide them with a pass for free travel on public transport or arrange a dedicated bus, minibus or taxi. However, to meet their duty, the travel that they arrange must be suitable for the needs of the child concerned. The Department for Education provides comprehensive statutory guidance to help local authorities meet this duty.

The Government already expect local transport authorities to take account of the needs of all people travelling, including children travelling to school. Effective collaboration between local transport authorities and local authorities delivering home-to-school transport may bring benefits, but it would not be appropriate to place a duty relating to home-to-school transport on local transport authorities when statutory responsibility for that service rests elsewhere. For these reasons, Amendment 65 is unnecessary.

Amendment 66 relates to children travelling outside their local authority boundary to access a suitable school place. The statutory duty that requires local authorities with education functions to arrange free travel for all eligible children applies regardless of whether a child’s school is outside the council’s boundary. Where a child with special educational needs has an education, health and care plan, the school named in that plan will almost always be considered to be their nearest suitable school for the purposes of assessing their eligibility for free travel. It is already commonplace for local authorities to arrange free travel. For this reason, this amendment is unnecessary.

Amendment 67 concerns the application of VAT to transport for pupils with special educational needs who attend private schools. These services may already be exempt from VAT; for example, passenger transport in a vehicle with 10 or more seats does not pay any VAT, and operating a vehicle that has been constructed or modified to cater for the special needs of people with disabilities may also not pay any VAT. The Government’s ambition is a state-funded school place for every child who wants one, whether they have special educational needs or not. The Department for Education’s reforms, which I have already mentioned, will deliver an inclusive mainstream system that meets the needs of as many children and young people as possible in their local community.

I also draw the noble Lord’s attention to the consultation on the national insurance contributions Bill, which says at paragraph 2.13:

“The policy intention is to only capture education services and vocational training supplied by a private school, or a ‘closely connected person’, and closely related boarding services. The government recognises that other goods and services ‘closely related’ to education, such as school meals, transport, and books and stationery, are integral to children accessing education. As a result, other ‘closely related’ goods and services other than boarding (i.e. goods and services that are provided by a private school for the direct use of their pupils and that are necessary for delivering the education to their pupils) will remain exempt from VAT”.


I therefore consider this amendment unnecessary.

Finally, Amendment 68 concerns the impact that the increase in employer national insurance contributions will have on bus services for children with special educational needs. The Government recognise that the increase to employer national insurance contribution will have a varying impact across sectors but had to make difficult decisions to help restore economic stability.

As I have remarked already, local authorities are responsible for arranging home-to-school travel and deliver this through a range of providers. Department for Education officials engage regularly with local authorities to understand the challenges that they face and will continue to monitor this situation. It is expected that private sector organisations that contract with local authorities will take the impact of national insurance changes into account, along with other changes to their cost base, in the usual way through contract negotiations.

My noble friend Lord Livermore, at Second Reading of the NIC Bill on 6 January, said in response to a question about NICs and special educational needs transport:

“The right reverend Prelate also asked about SEN transport. In the Budget, the Government announced £2 billion of new grant funding for local government in 2025-26. This includes £515 million to support councils with the increase in employer national insurance contributions, which covers special educational needs home-to-school transport schemes”.—[Official Report, 6/1/25; col. 601.]

[Lord Moylan (Con)]

My Lords, does the noble Lord accept that that is true for special educational transport needs provided directly by local education authorities using their own employees but not for contracted services, which are very widely used?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for his intervention. I was referring to support to local authorities for home-to-school transport schemes. I will take that away and come back to him with the clarification that he seeks in this respect. I can say that the Government do not expect the changes to national insurance to have a significant impact on home-to-school travel for children with special educational needs, so it would not be proportionate to conduct the assessment as the amendment suggests. I do not think that it is required.

[The Earl of Effingham (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, my noble friend Lord Moylan, and the Minister for their contributions in this debate. We have heard so much in the Chamber about how SEND pupils may be adversely affected by various new government policies, so we feel that a review, or an impact assessment as per these assessments, is a fair and reasonable request. For now, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment in my name.

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[The Earl of Effingham (Con)]

My Lords, perhaps I might briefly address one of the suggestions of the noble Lord, Lord Goddard. I was present in the Chamber, as I frequently am, during the Football Governance Bill. I appreciate that he might not be that interested in the difference between the crests and the arms, but the College of Arms is run by my noble kinsman His Grace the Duke of Norfolk, and I can tell him that the argument put forward as between crest and arms is relevant and has implications. It is important to realise that. He may well want to look into it; I am happy to explain to him why it is important, if he is interested.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

My Lords, the imminence of the recess suggests to me that I should not challenge the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, in his knowledge of the history of the traffic commissioners, but I will do that over a drink some time. I am less interested in the development of the Road Traffic Act 1930, or indeed the Transport Act 1985, than I am in the future of the bus service in the 2020s.

Traffic commissioners play an important and strategic role in the transport sector and, these days—principally but not wholly—in road use safety. I certainly refute completely any suggestion that there is an absence of enforcement; the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency does that. Traffic commissioners are an admirably economic and cost-effective way of dispensing justice to bus operators and bus drivers—those who are licensed to provide these important and, indeed, safe services—in a way that is widely celebrated in the industry and regarded as far more effective than any other solution. Indeed, the independent review of the traffic commissioner function undertaken by the Ministry of Justice, published in May 2023, found that

“the Traffic Commissioner function generally operates effectively”

and noted a strong level of support from the industry for functions continuing to sit with the traffic commissioner. The truth is that for a regulatory arrangement to be so widely celebrated by the industry it regulates is something to be celebrated, rather than abolished.

[Lord Moylan (Con)]

My Lords, is the Minister not rather concerned that the regulator is so widely celebrated by the industry it regulates?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

One of the reasons why is because it is not in the industry’s interest to have poor-quality operations competing with it; that is true in respect of both the goods sector and the passenger transport sector. When the traffic commissioners take enforcement action, including depriving drivers or operators of their licences or curtailing them, it is widely celebrated by those operators who do take account of the law and operate safely. That is what is important.

On our earlier discussion about the safety of bus operations and bus drivers, finding a mechanism that is effective for disciplining those drivers and operators who transgress the law—sometimes with no intention of complying with it—is very effective. I encourage noble Lords to consider the alternative mechanism of taking taxi drivers in front of magistrates’ courts, which are often found by everybody looking at the actions of the magistrates to be excessively lenient and persuaded by drivers’ explanations of their behaviour that would never pass muster with the traffic commissioner. It is a very important judicial function, and the commissioners need to be supported.

Returning to the Bill, your Lordships will have noticed that some limited changes are proposed to the functions of the commissioners. These include changes to services operating under service permits with enfranchised areas and powers to act against bus operators who breach the mandatory training requirement. The Bill is about empowering local leaders to take decisions on how best to run bus services in their areas. The presence of traffic commissioners across the regions of England—and, for that matter, Scotland and Wales—is complementary to this Bill’s objectives. They are well placed to use local knowledge to take the decisions they do in the execution of their powers, and I certainly do not believe that the noble Lord has made any case for change in the way that this amendment suggests.

[Lord Moylan (Con)]

My Lords, I beg leave to withdraw.

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Moved by

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill]

81: Clause 30, page 31, line 1, leave out subsection (2)
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment provides for Clause 21 of the Bill to be brought into force by regulations instead of coming into force two months after Royal Assent. This is to allow sufficient time for guidance under new section 144D of the Transport Act 2000 (inserted by Clause 21 of the Bill) to be prepared.

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[The Earl of Effingham (Con)]

My Lords, I am aware that we have already discussed various aspects of this amendment in the debates, so I will be brief. Before we move forward with significant changes to our bus services, we think it very important to pause and ask: what will this mean for rural communities? That is precisely why this amendment is so important. It would ensure that before Clauses 1 to 15 of the Bill take effect, the Secretary of State must publish a report assessing the impact on rural areas.

This report is not about delaying progress; it is about ensuring informed progress. We need to understand whether these reforms will improve rural connectivity or unintentionally make services even harder to access. Will funding be allocated fairly? Will small operators that serve rural routes still be viable? Will local authorities have the powers and resources needed to support these services? These are critical questions that must be answered before the Bill comes into force. I beg to move.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I thank the noble Earl, Lord Effingham, for his remarks on Amendment 82. I also thank him, the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, and all other noble Lords for the issues they have raised in Committee. I have found the exchanges useful in discussing the purpose of the Bill and considering issues raised across your Lordships’ Committee. The Bill reflects how important it is to improve local buses for passengers across the country, including those who are woefully underserved in rural areas. Throughout this process, the needs of people living and working in and visiting rural areas have been integral to policy development.

Government officials have worked hard to publish a thorough and comprehensive impact assessment that has been rated green by the independent Regulatory Policy Committee. The assessment covers every one of the Bill’s measures in detail, including in the context of rural areas, so I am afraid I would struggle to justify why a further duplicate assessment is required. Although the noble Earl says this is not about delay, the amendment would have the potential to delay progress on the Bill and therefore to delay its introduction in areas that need its provisions.

It is important to remember that the freedoms allowed by the Bill to franchise and set up a local authority bus company are entirely optional. These powers simply give local transport authorities more choices in how their bus networks are operated. If a rural authority decides to establish a local authority bus company, it will have the flexibility to scale the company to match the needs of its local passengers, its ambitions for the network and the available funding. Additionally, it is important to highlight that the Government have allocated funding to build LTA capacity and capability on buses, including, but not limited to, the Bus Centre of Excellence. They also plan to pilot different franchising models that may be particularly suited to rural areas.

I conclude my remarks there, and once again thank all noble Lords for the excellent debates across the days we have shared in Grand Committee. I look forward to further debate on Report.