Greater Manchester Combined Authority (Functions and Amendment) Order 2019

Lord Kennedy of Southwark Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd April 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bradley (Lab)]

My Lords, I shall speak very briefly to this order to give it my strong support. I declare my interest as a resident of Manchester and in the light of the opening comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, I am also a former city councillor and a former Member of Parliament for the city. The people of Greater Manchester desperately want an integrated transport system across the area. The order is a further step in the right direction to achieve this by unblocking some of the logjams currently in the system. Its primary purpose, as the Minister has well explained, is the transfer of further powers to the elected mayor of Greater Manchester—Andy Burnham—particularly transport functions of the Greater Manchester Combined Authority relating to buses. This is in line with the devolution agreements in Greater Manchester, which specifically provided that any potential future bus franchising and/or smart-ticketing functions should be the responsibility of the mayor.

I wish to make three quick points. First, I welcome the establishment of the joint transport committee to cover Greater Manchester. I hope that this smaller group will bring a new, coherent focus on an integrated transport system across the area, covering not only the buses but the Metrolink light rail system and the region’s train services, with a particular emphasis on establishing a multimodal through-ticketing system, which is so strongly supported by all local people.

Secondly, we have heard some detail about finance, and it is pleasing that the 10 districts in Greater Manchester have agreed that all transport functions relating to buses that currently sit with the combined authority should become mayoral functions and the current expenditure level of around £87 million will continue to be paid by those councils. However, any additional expenditure on buses beyond that figure should be funded by the mayor through the transport precept or other resources available to the mayor. I believe that this should underpin the cost of new bus passes for 16 to 18 year-olds, which are about to be piloted and then rolled out for all 16 to 18 year-olds for the future. However, the amount of the precept does not form part of the constituent districts’ budget, and the mayoral precept itself will be subject to its own referendum triggers—perhaps a topic we should not pursue on this occasion.

Thirdly, the Bus Services Act 2017 allows an assessment of a proposed franchising scheme. While this is not full reregulation of the buses, which London benefits from, it is clearly the best option available in the circumstances. The order facilitates the franchising option, and I now hope that the mayor, Andy Burnham, will grasp the opportunity and see it as a vital step in the overarching aim of delivering the integrated transport system that the people of Greater Manchester dearly want.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, I draw the attention of the House to my relevant registered interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association. Like my noble friend Lord Bradley and the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, I very much welcome this order. It is another part of the transfer of powers to the northern powerhouse, to the mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, and to the combined authority. It will be able to deliver bus franchising, smart ticketing and the multimodal ticketing system that my noble friend talked about.

I was involved in the passage of the Bus Services Act through your Lordships’ House and I am very supportive of bus franchising; the mayor will be able to set the fares, the routes and the timetables and the bus companies can then deliver those services. I think that is a very good way forward and I endorse what my noble friend Lord Bradley said: I hope that the Mayor of Greater Manchester will be able to move forward and introduce bus franchising, which is what people want to see locally.

The noble Lord, Lord Stunell, raised a number of questions I was going to raise, so I hope he will get a response. They were about the taxation trap—we clearly have the same briefing—and the issue of the oversight committee, so I look forward to the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Bourne, on those matters and on the question raised by my noble friend Lord Bradley about bus passes for16 to 18 year-olds. I shall leave the matter there because those points have been raised. As I said, I very much support the introduction of the order, like the other noble Lords who have spoken.

[Lord Bourne of Aberystwyth]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lords who have participated in the debate on this important SI. It is worth noting that in the other place there was just one contribution from the Official Opposition, which welcomed the SI and commended the Government for acting very quickly in bringing it forward following the request from Greater Manchester. I am very grateful for that support in the other place.

The noble Lord, Lord Stunell, rightly referred to the civic pride and sense of togetherness in Manchester, and the rivalry between some of the boroughs and authorities that now make up the Greater Manchester Combined Authority. All that is absolutely true—I was in Manchester recently and saw the strength of the Manchester area. Of course, we were all very conscious of that at the time of the dreadful terrorist attack on the Manchester Arena—the sense of coming together in the area was very strong. I was there recently to launch the ESOL funding programme. There was a very good bid from Manchester and I was very conscious, again, of the sense of coming together and civic pride.

The noble Lord, Lord Stunell, also asked about financial arrangements, particularly in relation to the mayoral precept. It is the position that the mayor makes proposals which can be overturned by a two-thirds vote, which is a veto of seven of the 10 authorities. The noble Lord went on to ask about measures in relation to oversight in this committee. It is a streamlined committee, a fact welcomed by the noble Lord, Lord Bradley, for which I am very grateful. The order reflects the request for flexibility on the membership of the committee. Greater Manchester asked for the reduction to 23 members, and based on what the noble Lord was saying about responding to the bottom-up approach and sensing what is important in the area, we went along with the request. We judged that it is reasonable and will lead, as the noble Lord, Lord Bradley, said, to more streamlined decision-making. I think it maintains—not in the same proportions, I accept—some of the checks and balances that are needed.

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Bradley, for saying that transferring powers to the Mayor of Manchester is a step in the right direction. Although the mayor is not of my politics I think that people locally recognise that he has been doing a good job and giving some sense of direction to Manchester. That is a good thing and it is true of all our metro mayors. It is something we should welcome widely and, as the noble Lord rightly said, it opens up possibilities in relation to the franchising schemes and so on as well. I confirm that I think it does underpin the costs of the young people’s passes in relation to the financial settlement.

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, for the welcome he gave to the order; he reiterated some of the questions I hope I have dealt with. This is an important part of the suite of powers that were promised to Manchester: we have been listening to the people of Manchester and responding to what they have asked for, and this represents another step in that journey. I am very grateful to the support given by noble Lords and I beg to move.