Payments to Train Operating Companies

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Tuesday 15th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

In the broader scope of things, Great British Railways will be developing the whole industry strategic plan; the call for evidence for that has now closed. We are also asking each train operating company to produce annual business plans, which will streamline the passenger offer, make sure demand is actually met and in balance with the supply, remove duplication, as I said, and ensure that operations are as efficient as possible.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

It is clear that government demand in savings running into many millions of pounds will result in cuts in Network Rail’s maintenance budget. We have already seen what a casual approach to Network Rail and the use of outside contractors can lead to in the light of previous accidents at Ladbroke Grove and Potters Bar, and a recent report into the train crash at Stonehaven in 2020 found that a drainage system wrongly built by Carillion, which subsequently went bust, and left unchecked by Network Rail led to the crash. The Rail Accident Investigation Bureau said that the tragedy was

“a reminder how potentially dangerous Britain’s volatile weather can be.”

How did the Government come to the conclusion that now is an appropriate time to make major cuts in maintenance roles on our railways, and will they now reconsider their decision in the interests of safety, which should be the paramount consideration, rather than financial considerations?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

Safety is, of course, the priority for everybody who works in the railways, and the tragedy at Stonehaven is deeply regrettable. The Government have no intention of diminishing the work we do on safety and maintenance—it is extremely important—but we must look for efficiencies within the system, because we have seen this significant reduction in demand, we must make sure that we protect the taxpayers’ investment, and that is what we are doing.

Electric Vehicles: Charging Points

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Monday 14th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

Sadly there are not enough. I understand that there are some available in the car park for another place. As I have said previously, it is not for the Government to install charging points in the Palace of Westminster, although I encourage the authorities to do so.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

My Lords, about a third of households have no access to off-street parking or a personal garage and miss out on lower costs from charging cars using cheaper overnight electricity. While 76% of the richest households have access to off-street parking, the same is true for only just over half of the poorest fifth of households. Put another way, only 51% of private renters, 38% of housing association tenants, and 26% of local authority renters, have access to off-street parking, compared with 81% of homeowners. What do the Government intend to do, and by when, to address this charging divide which works against the less well off, and to reduce the disparity in prices across the charging network? We have heard a glowing picture from the Government just now about what is happening. They say that they have spent a lot of money. It seems to have been a lot of money that has created a charging divide, and from what the Minister has said, it is largely the fault of local authorities. I think that it is the fault of the Government.

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

My Lords, the Government have already taken action—

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

What is it?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

One moment; the EV home-charge scheme, which the noble Lord will know was previously focused on single-unit owner-occupied households, is now being closed to those households and is focusing entirely on those people who are in rented or leasehold accommodation, specifically without their own designated parking. We are switching that very important source of funding to ensure that those who do not have the luxury of off-street parking and home ownership can get a charger.

Goods Vehicles (Licensing of Operators) (Amendment) Regulations 2022

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2022 Grand Committee

[Baroness Randerson (LD)]

My Lords, I start by thanking the Minister for her explanation, including of the error. I am happy to accept that it will be corrected in due course.

The Government are going to some lengths here to comply with the terms of the TCA—but only just. This SI certainly follows the letter of our obligations under the TCA but does the absolute minimum required to do so, and in doing that, actually creates a more complex situation. As with so much associated with the post-Brexit legislation, it makes life more difficult and complex for small businesses.

The new EU regulations are tightening road safety requirements—that is obviously the intention of all this—by applying licensing to heavy goods vehicles that are less heavy than was previously the case. The Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee notes that this will apply to around 4,200 goods vehicle operators. It also notes that the legislation applies to Northern Ireland, too. In the case of Northern Ireland, the realities of the situation include, of course, not just the protocol but the fact that, in practice, goods vehicles cross and re-cross the border all the time, and can do so even if, for example, they start out in Northern Ireland to deliver goods to Northern Ireland, going east to west and west to east; the route can take them across the border several times. That is the way the road runs. So this could be a requirement for Northern Ireland operators a great deal more often than it will be in GB as a whole. So my question to the Minister is: am I right to assume that the vast majority of operators in Northern Ireland will have to adopt these new licences, at least as a precautionary principle?

In Britain as a whole, people will not need the licence for passenger vehicles—or they will not once the Minister has corrected the legislation. That seems simple enough, but it will also not be needed if the vehicle is not to be used internationally for hire or reward. That is a more complex issue. It is quite obvious if the vehicle you are running is a passenger vehicle, but it is less obvious if it is going to travel abroad. If you are running a Tesco delivery vehicle, you will know that it is not going abroad. But suppose you do small-scale removal of domestic equipment; you might operate for months or years without ever going abroad, then suddenly get a job that involves doing so. For a long time, you would have assumed that you do not need this licence, but that might prove a mistake and you might need to get it. That is why transport managers are so important. As the people responsible for licensing and insurance, it is their job to make sure that that sort of error does not happen, but there are some very small companies in which this kind of role might be overlooked.

The SI allows for a period of exemption so that companies and their managers can gain the required certificates. The Explanatory Memorandum says that efforts have been made to do this in time to allow companies to prepare, but in fact it comes into force on 21 May, which is a very short time span. I accept that the Government will do their best on this from this day onwards, because it comes into force tomorrow, but it is not long for people to prepare.

I welcome the limitation on who can take up acquired rights based on their previous experience. From paragraph 7.18 of the Explanatory Memorandum, it is obvious that training for transport managers increases safe working practices. I welcome the much more stringent requirement for transport managers generally, such as the limitation on the number of vehicles they can supervise, but it is illogical that they can operate an unlimited number of domestic vehicles. If you run a company with hundreds of vehicles, you will have little time to deal with the relatively small number of vehicles that are used internationally. My question to the Minister is: does the nation have a ready supply of properly qualified and experienced people for the role of transport manager, as it will obviously become more complex? Will the lack of transport managers be yet another hurdle for the freight industry to face this year?

I have a question to the Minister about paragraph 7.30 of the Explanatory Memorandum, which says that there will not be local advertising of the need for the new licences. So how will the industry know about them? What are the Government doing to inform freight operators in general, especially small companies? The big companies will know, but the small companies will need help.

I have another question for the Minister, about the enhanced role for traffic commissioners that comes from this legislation. They clearly have an important regulatory role, but what additional resources are they being allocated for this important additional work?

Finally, paragraph 7.35 sets out a new requirement for operators to try to prevent “bogus operations”. This is clearly informed by bitter experience of the past. I do not think it is necessary for the Minister to explain it to us here, but there is clearly a problem. As this is obviously a significant and specific problem that is being dealt with in this legislation, can the Minister tell us how such activities will be inspected to ensure that the requirement in paragraph 7.35 is as effective as the Government clearly hope it will be?

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

I too thank the Minister for her explanation of the content and purpose of these regulations. I take the same view as the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, does about the error. I thought I heard the Minister say that a wider review of the SI process is taking place. The only comment I would make is that this is not the first time we have had an error in a Department for Transport SI. I am sure that is much to the Minister’s frustration. Perhaps it is understandable that a wider review of the process is going on. I do not wish to say any more about that subject than that.

I noticed that the Explanatory Memorandum says, under the heading “Purpose of the instrument”:

“The UK is obliged to implement these changes following commitments included in the … Trade and Cooperation Agreement”.


I suppose that is an effort by the Government to make it clear that they are not really doing it willingly; it is because they have to. But some of us thought, perhaps incorrectly, that the trade and co-operation agreement had been freely entered into—in the way that the Northern Ireland protocol was freely entered into—and that the Government thought it was a good agreement. Judging by the Prime Minister’s comments at the time, he thought that was a pretty good deal. I only make the comment—I think this is something the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, alluded to—that whenever we come across anything to do with the EU there is always wording that makes it fairly clear that if the Government had their way they would not be doing anything along the lines of that particular instrument, which is perhaps unfortunate.

As I understand it, the Government are not introducing environmental requirements for HGV operators that stem from UK law. In the Commons, the Minister said that these

“are not required by the TCA.”

Is that now the test when it comes to environmental requirements: it is not whether they are desirable or needed, but simply whether they are “required”? Should environmental issues not be looked at on the basis of whether they are desirable or needed, rather than whether you are required to do it in some agreement or another? Perhaps I misunderstood the point that appears to have been made.

As has been said, these requirements apply only to LGVs on international trips, primarily to the EU. They do not apply domestically in the UK market. It is clear that the UK Government have no plans to regulate further, yet I think I am right in saying that the Minister in the Commons said that the operator licensing system

“continues to be vital to properly manage the use of large vehicles within the UK market.”—[Official Report, Commons, Second Delegated Legislation Committee, 28/2/22; col. 4.]

I am just interested to hear the response. Why do the Government think that the licensing system would not be needed for LGVs in the UK market? Which parts that are needed for LGVs for international trips are deemed unnecessary and bureaucratic to apply within the UK markets? I presume that that is the Government’s argument for them not wanting to apply in the UK markets, because the Government consider them bureaucratic but are obliged to apply them because of the trade and co-operation agreement, which the Government freely entered into.

Bus Improvement Plans

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Tuesday 8th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

I absolutely agree with my noble friend, and there is an awful lot that we will work together on with the local authorities, versus what they have in their BSIPs, to encourage those who do have concessionary passes to come back to bus, because we miss them terribly. Regarding concessionary payments, we published concessionary travel recovery guidance—late last year, I think, but definitely pre-omicron—that looked at how we are going to get concessionary fares matched up to passholders. At the moment, there is a discrepancy because we are paying concessionary amounts out in full. We are looking at that again to make sure it takes omicron into account, but I agree with my noble friend that concessionary passholders are welcome back to bus any day.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

Last week I asked for confirmation that

“none of the emergency support or recovery grants for buses has been taken out of the £3 billion for buses and bus services by 2025 announced under the Bus Back Better strategy, and that all the emergency support and recovery grants are in addition to that £3 billion”.

The reply was:

“The Government have committed to spend £3 billion over the course of this Parliament, so I suggest to the noble Lord that, when we get to the end of this Parliament, we do a totting up.”—[Official Report, 1/3/22; col. 681.]


For the benefit of the less academically gifted, like me, did that answer mean that all the emergency support and recovery grants are or are not in addition to the £3 billion under the Bus Back Better strategy—or is that a question to which the Secretary of State also has no idea of the answer?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

My Lords, we committed to £3 billion of new spend over the course of this Parliament, and that is what we will deliver. In addition, the noble Lord will recall that my noble friend Lord McLoughlin asked a question about other parts of funding within the system. There will be a letter in the Library, which I will also share with noble Lords who have spoken in today’s debate, setting out exactly all the different funding streams available for buses. They are significant. Some are very long standing, some came from Covid and others will be part of the funding from BSIPs and CRSTSs, et cetera.

Bus Services: Covid-19 Emergency Funding

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Tuesday 1st March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

My noble friend is quite right. It is extraordinary how many different streams of funding go into the whole bus network system. This can be to the operators directly, or to local authorities—some of which comes from the Department for Transport and some from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. I will respond to my noble friend with a letter which draws this all together. It is a substantial sum of money. Combined with some of the money we are putting into the infrastructure of major urban centres—for example, CRSTS—there is a lot of money going into buses, and we need to ensure that we make the best use of it.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

Will the Minister confirm that none of the emergency support or recovery grants for buses has been taken out of the £3 billion for buses and bus services by 2025 announced under the Bus Back Better strategy, and that all the emergency support and recovery grants are in addition to that £3 billion?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

The Government have committed to spend £3 billion over the course of this Parliament, so I suggest to the noble Lord that, when we get to the end of this Parliament, we do a totting up.

Railway Stations: Facilities

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Tuesday 1st February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

Unfortunately, I do not have the figures to hand. As the noble Baroness points out, 60% of stations currently have tactile paving and we are very keen to move that to 100%. One of the key elements of The Williams-Shapps Plan for Rail is a national accessibility audit that will look at every single station across the network. It will have a detailed look at the facilities and the standards to ensure that everywhere is accessible.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

There is huge regional disparity in disability access at railway stations across the country. As part of the new stations fund, a small number of railway stations have opened in recent years. Can the Government give a commitment that at least all new stations, opened or reopened, will always have full disability access and full access to all facilities for disabled passengers?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for raising that. Although I would love to make that commitment at the Dispatch Box, as it is completely reasonable, I will have to write to him so that I can 100% confirm that that is the case. It is also important that we look at retrofitting the stations that we have. The Government have extended to 2024 the Access For All programme and provided £350 million-worth of funding.

Electric Vehicle Charge Points

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Wednesday 26th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

I would be a little cautious about that. It may look as though the Government were feathering the nest of Parliament, and I do not think that would be a good idea.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

The Competition and Markets Authority reported last July and urged the Government to intervene in the electric car charger market to prevent what it described as “charging deserts” and increase availability in locations outside London that remain underserved. As I understand it, across the UK there are huge regional inequalities in the number of available charging points. In London, there are 80 charging devices per 100,000 people, but in Yorkshire, for example, there are fewer than 20 per 100,000. What steps are the Government taking to support new charging points in areas that are currently lacking? If the answer is “not very much”, it just shows that the Government’s levelling-up slogan is just that—a slogan—and no more.

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

The Government encourage every local authority to look at its local needs. We have a fund of £20 million per year to which 135 local authorities have already applied. That fund is there to put chargers in local areas where there are fewer publicly available chargers and there will be a local EV infrastructure fund launching soon.

Transport Act 2000 (Air Traffic Services Licence Modification Appeals) (Prescribed Aerodromes) Regulations 2022

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Tuesday 25th January 2022 Grand Committee

When the Government were—how can I put this?—caught out by the reality of the situation, they said, with schoolboy bravado, “We’ll build our own”. But, as the noble Lord, Lord Davies, has made absolutely clear, you do not do that overnight, and the industry estimates that it would take 10 to 15 years. What do we do in the meantime? Norway and Switzerland, which are not members of the EU, have negotiated access to EGNOS. Why cannot we? Will the Minister explain how much it would cost and what can be done in reality in the immediate future to plug the gap left by losing this essential technology?

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

I start by saying that I will probably end up making the shortest speech so far—I hasten to add that that is in no way a criticism of any speeches made, but simply a statement of fact. Like others, I thank the Minister for her explanation of the content and purpose of these regulations. Although I have in front of me a statement on the background and what the regulations do, I will not wade through it; the Minister and others have already outlined that.

I raise one issue only, but say before that that I await with great interest the answers to the questions raised by the noble Baronesses, Lady Foster of Oxton and Lady Randerson, the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower, and my noble friend Lord Berkeley. I refer to the statement by Robert Courts MP, which is in the EM:

“The intention of this measure is to ensure that airports which receive an approach control service from the licence holder through its licence are able to appeal decisions relating to modification of licence conditions”.


The EM goes on to say that:

“The number of expected licence modifications over a 20-year period is expected to be between 8 and 16 modifications for major modifications such as price controls, and between 6 and 18 modifications for minor modifications such as procedural changes.”


Like others, I am not sure what workload or otherwise that would generate, so some clarification would be helpful.

I ask that in the context of paragraph 12.4 of the EM, which has already been referred to. It says that:

“In allowing prescribed aerodromes to appeal decisions there is the potential that a greater number of appeals will be launched. However, during the consultation phrase, no aerodromes requested appeal rights, which suggests they may be unlikely to appeal modifications to licence conditions.”


Bearing in mind that the more major modifications may relate to price controls, are there any criteria for changing those price controls? If it is confidently expected that there will be no appeals, presumably, when the changes are made, if they are, they will be relatively limited as far as the prescribed aerodromes are concerned. The Minister has already mentioned which aerodromes those are.

I therefore seek further information about modifications to price controls, the criteria for making them, how frequently they are made—it appears to be fairly infrequent—and whether they have ever proved controversial before in relation to prescribed aerodromes. That is the only point I wish to raise. The subject matter covered by the SI seems straightforward and desirable, but I await the answers to the other issues that were raised with interest.

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

I am grateful to noble Lords for their contributions today. It has turned into a general debate on air stuff, so noble Lords will not be surprised that I came here with 49 pages of briefing to answer detailed questions on the SI and am therefore unable to answer issues that have been raised that, frankly, are not even close to the scope of what is before noble Lords today.

Noble Lords mentioned EGNOS to me recently. I have confirmed with the office of the Aviation Minister that he is happy to meet with you. All noble Lords with an interest may pop along to that meeting and I hope to get there as well.

My noble friend Lady Foster asked about unmanned aircraft. I am sure she would have appreciated being in the House for the Air Traffic Management and Unmanned Aircraft Bill. We had lots of fun. It took a long time, but we talked a lot about drones and the role of the CAA. I remain reassured that the CAA has a grip on the situation. In that Bill, we gave the police extra powers to ensure that drones are appropriately enforced, where needed. I will try to get a response for my noble friend Lord Davies of Gower about American licences.

I turn to the contents of this SI. The noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, will recall the challenges of getting the Air Traffic Management and Unmanned Aircraft Bill through, which is where these powers very much came from. But it was not necessarily the case that there was a great big gap between that and some of the failures that happened before. There were just two failures, which were obviously both very carefully investigated by the CAA, working very closely with NATS to establish exactly what happened. That work took quite a long time, and we know that, on 25 February last year, for example, following an investigation under the Transport Act 2000, the CAA published its final decision confirming that NERL had contributed some of its statutory and licence duties and obligations in the period January 2019 into 2020 in relation to the provision of sufficient staffing resilience in the London approach service for users of Stansted and Luton airports. In making its findings, the CAA took account of the very difficult circumstances faced by the aviation sector and the significant reduction of air traffic volumes following the Covid-19 pandemic. It strikes me that, prior to those powers being available, the CAA has historically had a firm grip on NATS and its activities, and continues to get very involved wherever there may be failings.

What is under discussion today is actually a very small and narrow element of the world of licences and the provision of air traffic management services. The CAA, as is stated in the Explanatory Memorandum, rarely updates the licence—but it does, and when it does, as I set out in my opening speech, it does it by consultation with everybody who is likely to be affected. Therefore, it is not a surprise to us, and I believe should not be a surprise to the industry either, that we expect appeals to be relatively rare, because an enormous amount of consultation will go on beforehand. We know that people will be able to put forward their views—and I believe that we discussed this during the passage of the ATMUA Bill, now the ATMUA Act, as to the appeals process, how likely the appeals were likely to be, and whether there were resources at the CMA. We went through all those things, and I believe that, when the Bill was passed, we had reached a pretty good assessment about how we felt the appeals process was going to be.

We know that no airports have actually asked for these powers, but the Government have, out of an abundance of caution, given them the ability to appeal, just in case they need to. The reality is that it is only going to be about a modification that is about a change of price, because essentially everything else is not really related to the airports. The airlines and owners of the aircraft have far more beef with it. For the airports, it is really about the hand-off between up there and down here, and the charge for that hand-off that they might want to challenge, but they have never given us any indication that they would do so. The chances of getting an SI passed if they wanted to do so in future is, quite frankly, probably not huge.

That is why we are doing this—just in case they want to. We are not expecting them to do so, and they have given us no indication that they will. But we said that we would do it in the Bill; we felt that it was the fair thing to do, and that is why we are here today. The figures that we put in the EM explain that there may be a 10% increase in the number of appeals. We feel that that may be high, but we have to put something in there. In general, that is why the impact assessment is de minimis, because from this SI there will be almost no impact at all. I have some figures for costs somewhere, and I might put it in a letter afterwards, but our estimated costs are very small.

To that end, we do not see that this SI will cause the CAA to have any resource implications at all. As we know, modifications are fairly infrequent and we expect appeals to be rare. Appeals for this particular thing are possibly like hens’ teeth. I very much hope that it does not have a full-time member of staff on it. However, I will write with information on the number of people who look after NERL licensing. That is a very good challenge and I will find out exactly how big that group is.

I note that the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, made a very short speech; I thank him for being here because I know that he has had an incredibly busy day in the Chamber as well. However, the points he raised about whether there is likely to be an appeal and what has to happen in order for that change to happen have been covered.

I have run out of things to say from the questions that I was asked. As ever, I will look through Hansard and write if necessary.

Train Driving Licences and Certificates (Amendment) Regulations 2022

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Monday 24th January 2022 Lords Chamber

I would like to put very simply the point already made by others: can the Minister tell us on what basis trains that exist already and go from London to Paris are taking place? There were other trains that have now been stopped because of Covid that used to go direct from London to Marseilles without any difficulty—a remarkable journey. There are those who would like to have trains that go from stations in Britain direct to Frankfurt and so on, and there is already one from London to Amsterdam. On what basis do these trains now operate if the regulations that we are discussing deal only with this Channel Tunnel envelope from Ashford to Calais? I am not quite sure on what basis the existing trains run, never mind future ones, and would be very grateful if she could address that in her reply.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

My Lords, I will try to be brief otherwise the Minister will not have a chance to respond. I thank her for her introductory comments and my noble friend Lord Berkeley for his amendment. In line with what the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, said, I too appreciated the Library briefing. Before I go any further, can I express the sincere hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Vere, will not be following the latest ministerial fashion and departing the Chamber earlier than anticipated.

The EU stopped recognising British-issued train driving licences on 1 January 2021, and European-issued train driving licences will no longer be valid in Great Britain after the end of this month apart from within the Channel Tunnel zone once the regulations are in force. The Government have stated in the Explanatory Memorandum that operators have already obtained European train driving licences

“for their drivers to ensure they are able to continue driving their trains”

through the Channel Tunnel because of how late these regulations have been brought before us. What has been the cost to train operators of having to obtain those European train driving licences for their drivers? Do their European train driving licences enable British drivers to drive throughout the EU, and for how long are these licences now valid?

The Government have confirmed that a cross-border driver holding a European train driving licence would also need to hold a British train driving licence to drive beyond the Channel Tunnel zone—for example, up to St Pancras International station. Drivers who are driving trains in Great Britain using an EU-issued train driving licence will need to apply for a British train driving licence from the ORR before the end of this month, and current holders will be considered as new applicants. Why will current holders be considered as new applicants?

I come back finally to the questions that virtually everybody else has asked. I think I noticed the Minister say that under EU provisions it would not have been possible for us to agree with France to be able to drive a train to Paris. I think she was saying that it had to be confined to the Channel Tunnel zone area. If I have misunderstood that, I am sure I will be corrected. Can the Government confirm that under the common European regime we had for certifying and licensing train drivers, British drivers could drive a Eurostar passenger train to Paris or Brussels, and indeed into Germany, and a French or Belgian driver drive a Eurostar train to St Pancras? The bilateral agreement with France would appear to apply only to the Channel Tunnel zone. Does that mean that British train drivers will not be able to drive a Eurostar passenger train or a freight train from Calais to Paris or Brussels or beyond and a French or Belgian driver drive a train to St Pancras? The answer may be, as others have suggested, that another licence is needed to do that. No doubt that is what the Minister will say in reply if that is the case. I can say only that, if that is correct, this would hardly appear to represent progress, bearing in mind what we previously had.

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

I thank all noble Lords who have taken part in this short debate and the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, for enabling us to discuss it in slightly more detail than perhaps we might have done otherwise. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Rosser, was sincere in not wishing me to depart. If he was not, it is not going to be his lucky day.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

I was sincere.

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

I turn first to the issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley. I can see where he is coming from. Noble Lords will recall from when we discussed operator licensing that there is this Channel Tunnel zone, the bit that France was allowed to reach an agreement with the UK over. It is the same for train driving licences as it was for other elements that we have discussed in the past.

The noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, asked why we cannot go further. We have been very clear on this. The European Commission knows exactly what its rights are, and they are quite extensive. It has said that France cannot negotiate with the UK to go further. Indeed, the European Commission did not convey any interest in including train driving licences in the trade and co-operation agreement. In any event, if mutual agreement had been sought at this level, it would likely have been conditional on dynamic alignment of train driving licensing regulations and possibly a continuing role for the Court of Justice of the European Union. That would have broken the UK’s red lines during negotiation.

All is not lost, however, and it is potentially a little more positive than some noble Lords fear. There will not be one train and two drivers; it is more the case that there will be one driver and two licences. Drivers for many of the operators already have both the European and GB licences. For the Channel Tunnel zone, they can also have the certificate of competence, or whatever the certification is called. They just need a single one of those, but if you are driving beyond that you need the relevant certificate covering the rolling stock and the infrastructure of whichever routes you are driving on; that is normal.

This does not seem to have held back the people who run the trains. I have some stats that I will not read out, but it strikes me that drivers for all the major operators have stepped up and got an additional licence where needed. Train driving licences issued by the ORR are free; there is no cost to the applicant, so it does not really matter if they are new applicants. It should also be noted that the existing training has not changed since we left the EU, so somebody trained in the EU has received the right training to get a GB licence.

We expect there to be a system in which people will simply have two licences. We do not see a future in which there would be a single licence. Do I think it will be a massive hurdle to the future of a fantastic vision for international rail travel? No, I do not. I am just pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, no longer has his companion pass, sucking up taxpayers’ funds in first class going to Europe—but I am sure he enjoyed it. I think all noble Lords will agree that travelling by train in Europe is a pleasurable experience, but one often has to change trains because the trains do not automatically go to where you are going—so you need another driver to get another train to go to a different place. Of course, we want the trains to be as good as possible. That is why Eurostar goes to Amsterdam, and obviously we continue to have Eurostar services into London and through to Paris.

I do not know that there is really much more I can say. The system, operators and drivers have managed to cope, the trains are still running and we expect them to run in future. There will be no legislative hiatus, as the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, feared. On the timeline of the regulations, the Government have been negotiating a number of elements with the French Government—the train driving licence element, the operator licensing element and the safety issues—and we did not get the train driver licensing element signed until 22 December because it had to be cleared by the European Commission. Together with the technical and complicated nature of these negotiations, this meant that January was the earliest these regulations could be debated. As I said, the agreement has been signed and therefore there should be no hiatus at all.

The noble Lord, Lord Rosser, asked me a couple of curveballs about how long a licence is valid for, and I do not know that answer, but I shall of course write, as I shall on other issues that I have not been able to cover.

I come briefly to the issue that the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, raised about HGV drivers working in the EU. She is right to pay tribute to the House of Lords Library. I read that in the Library briefing and thought, “Oh, I didn’t realise that.” It is true. The current requirements for obtaining drivers’ certificates of professional competence in the EU and the UK are the same. However, the EU has decided not to recognise the UK qualifications post Brexit for use by drivers based in the EU working for companies established in the EU. Of course, it will recognise a UK driver working in Europe, from a cabotage perspective—all those things remain the same—but the EU has taken a slightly different tack. Clearly, we think that we have taken the better tack, but who are we to argue?

As noble Lords will know, we are looking at the driver certificate of professional competence to see how well it works for the UK. I am not convinced that stating that you must have 35 hours’ training is useful: training in what? Beekeeping? We need to make sure that HGV drivers are studying what is useful from a continuing professional development perspective. So that is the situation for a DCPC in the EU.

Operators can register in the EU and get an EU operator licence; otherwise, if they have a UK operator licence, they are restricted by the cabotage arrangements that we have in place. That has not changed. I am not aware of any change to UK HGV testing that has had an impact on C+E drivers in France—that would be for HGV lorries. They are still able to drive in France.

The noble Baroness then went slightly off-piste by mentioning the queues at Dover. I appreciate that she knows she went off-piste, and I know that she was very keen to ask me a Private Notice Question today on it. I will write with more information on that. For the time being, I commend the regulations.

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

May I just confirm that, after the regulations come into effect, after the end of this month, a British driver driving a Eurostar train from London to Paris and to Brussels will require two licences to make that journey?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (Con)]

Correct, but, as I mentioned, the training is the same on both sides and there should be no barrier to the driver getting that second licence.

E-scooters

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Thursday 20th January 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Rosser (Lab)]

My Lords, as has been pointed out, this is one debate where the Minister gets more grief from behind her than from in front of her. I, too, thank the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, for securing and opening this debate.

As has been said, there are concerns about the use of e-scooters and the safety implications. I do not know whether the figures I have are anywhere near accurate, but as I understand it, in London there were 258 reported collisions in the first six months of last year, and no doubt a very much larger number of near-misses, which will have caused distress and fear for other road users—but, more concerningly, for pedestrians and wheelchair users, who do not expect to be mown down while on our pavements.

The Royal National Institute of Blind People has warned that e-scooters could pose dangers for blind people and has asked the Government whether they should each make a recognisable sound to alert pedestrians. E-scooters may be used on public roads in the UK only if they are part of a trial in a select number of areas. As part of these trials, e-scooters may be unlocked using a smartphone app and are limited, as I understand it, to 15 miles per hour and certain geographical locations. As the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, said, it has been reported that these trials are to be extended to late 2022.

Despite being currently illegal to use outside of private land, the Times estimates that there may be 750,000 personally owned e-scooters, which suggests either a lot of illegal use or a lot of suitable private land, or both. Due to reports of fires and the obvious threat to safety, e-scooters have been banned from Transport for London services and premises. Some 3,600 e-scooters were apparently seized by the Met police between January and November of last year, and any owners wanting to retrieve them must pay £150 and a £10 daily storage charge. I am not quite sure what else happens to them.

As I understand it—I am sure I will be corrected if I am wrong—in October 2020, the House of Commons Transport Select Committee recommended the legalisation of e-scooters. We cannot uninvent the technology, but as the question asked by this debate indicates, we need to ensure that there are relevant and appropriate regulations in place to address the safety concerns over the use of e-scooters if their general use is to be given the go-ahead. If they can provide a safe, relatively cheap and environmentally friendly method of transport, e-scooters could have much to offer, particularly if they encourage some people who use their car for shorter journeys in our towns and cities to switch their mode of transport.

I certainly hope that, in their response today, the Government will be able to update us on the progress with the trials and any emerging findings, particularly in relation to safety, and any initial thoughts they have on the scope of regulations that would be required in connection with the use of e-scooters. It would also be helpful to know whether they are or are not contemplating their legal use on pavements, and if they are satisfied that enough is being done—taking into account the cuts in police numbers over the past decade—to enforce the current law in relation to the illegal use of personally owned e-scooters on our public roads and pavements. Finally, what engagement do the Government currently have with the RNIB and other relevant organisations representing disabled people as part of the e-scooter trials?