Infrastructure Bill [HL]

Lord Whitty Excerpts

Tuesday 8th July 2014 Grand Committee

[Lord Jenkin of Roding (Con)]

My Lords, I take this opportunity to thank my noble friend and her private office for the help that we were given after last week’s sitting with the supply of the documents to which she had referred and to which the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, has also just referred. I am very grateful. I, too, have read them, and the draft licence in particular, with all the caveats surrounding it, which I totally understand, is a very helpful indication. It might have been helpful if I had known about it when we were discussing the purposes of setting up this body and what its objectives would be.

I would have expected a remuneration committee to be the sort of thing to be covered by the articles of association. Indeed, the paper that the Minister has circulated, entitled Strategic Highways Company: Approach to the Articles of Association, makes reference to the,

“Model Articles for a company limited by shares”.

Of course, this company cannot be the same as that because, in a sense, it is rather different with all the shares owned by the Secretary of State. However, I would have expected the whole question of a remuneration committee to be covered by the articles when they are finally drawn up and issued.

It is absolutely within the powers of a board of directors to decide how that is going to operate, but I think that it is not unreasonable that the Secretary of State should keep a very close eye on this issue. Some of the remuneration that has been paid—not only in the private sector, as the noble Lord, Lord Davies, implied, but sometimes also in the public sector—has been a bit absurd and given rise to a good deal of criticism and uneasiness. I should have expected the Secretary of State to want to keep a close eye on what the company is doing. As I understand it, it will primarily be for the articles of association to spell out this sort of thing, and I would be most grateful if my noble friend would be willing to confirm that.

[Lord Whitty (Lab)]

My Lords, I support the amendment because it raises wider issues. Although I do not want to go over much of what was said in our previous sitting, the Minister gave some unsatisfactory answers. Since then, like my noble friend Lord Berkeley, I have read the draft licence agreement, which does not answer most of my points or, indeed, the points regarding this amendment. Before we get to Report, we need to be clear—either through draft articles of association or through some greater management guidance for the proposed, hived-off company—about what the company can and cannot do.

On reading the impact assessment, it appears that the alleged benefits of this hiving-off arise almost entirely from the certainty of funding. They do not seem to arise significantly—the £3.8 billion over 10 years arises almost entirely from the certainty of funding on maintenance and schemes within that timescale. Very little of it seems to arise from better management, novel forms of contracts or technological improvements. If that is the case, all that the Treasury and Secretary of State need to do is ensure that there is firm funding from Parliament. Admittedly, a Parliament lasts only five years, and the aggregate period we are talking about is 10 years; but, nevertheless, the institutional change of itself does not seem to deliver a significant contribution to that alleged net benefit.

The questions on how the company runs its staffing, and how it recruits and pays the management, could have a bearing on that, but it is never explicit. It is certainly not explicit in the documents to which we have referred. The anxiety of the rest of the staff and the PCS union is that, although moving away from the Civil Service may mean that the Government can pay the senior management significantly more—if they are going to go the way of HS2 and pay the 23 senior managers, the chief executive or anyone else, more than the Prime Minister, that will be difficult for anyone to accept politically—the rest of the staff will face greater insecurity, as my noble friend has said, as well as the possibility of changes to all their terms and conditions.

Therefore, for the morale of the existing Highways Agency staff, unless we are explicit about what the advantages of better management and a better situation for the workforce will be, it will be difficult to envisage a wholehearted endorsement of this proposition from the staff. Unless there is a reflection of some improved management in terms of the benefits of the hiving-off, as distinct from the substantial assumptions about what the certainty of funding delivers, the case for going through all this change begins to look a bit thin.

[The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Baroness Kramer) (LD)]

My Lords, let me deal with a couple of issues. I will be talking about fines under the next grouping, so if the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Oldham, will indulge me, I will leave that conversation until that point, so as not to be repetitive. He asked a question about paying VAT. The SHC will not be required to pay VAT, which is exactly the same as for the HA now. That should clear up that issue. To pick up on discussions in the Committee’s previous sitting, he asked about funding certainty and whether that impacts on future flexibility. It must impact on future flexibility, but we have been very clear that we have been making sure that we strike a balance between providing long-term certainty of funding and recognising the democratic right of any new Government to come to different decisions. As the noble Lord will remember, we are making the process highly transparent and consultative, so that any change in the RIS will have to be through a very clear process, which means that it is explicit and all can see what is taking place. I think the noble Lord understands how that balance is being struck.

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[Lord Bradshaw (LD)]

This brings us to another clause and concerns the payment of fines, to which reference was just made by the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Oldham.

The clause refers to the “Secretary of State” in successive subsections, and I believe that that might be wrong. One of the advantages of the Office of Rail Regulation is that it is independent from the Government. It is the Office of Rail Regulation that sets fines for Network Rail when it does not comply with the official standards that the regulator has approved. It may be a question of semantics, and it may be relevant to ask whether the ORR should not become the “Office of Transport Regulation” to stop comments such as those we heard this afternoon of something being done to roads by the rail lobby. I totally disagree with what was said, but to stop this bickering between both sides it might be better to make it the office of transport regulation.

There is a process with the railway. As it approaches the control period, which is a five-yearly period, the industry says what it would like. The Government then say how much money is available and the regulator decides how much an efficient undertaker—Network Rail in that case—needs to carry out the job that it has to do.

The Office of Rail Regulation has just issued a fine to Network Rail because Network Rail has failed to live up to the punctuality targets that had been set for it by the regulator. The money from the fine—this is very interesting—is going to be spent on providing wi-fi access for railway commuters; it is not going back into the maw of the Treasury. I believe that this might be behind the wording in Clause 5 saying that the fine will be levied by the regulator. If it is the intention that the fines will go towards the benefit of the user—in this case, the motorist or people running lorries—it needs to be carefully thought through how that will be achieved. I fully applaud the principle, but in order to get satisfactory separation from the Secretary of State it would be much better if the Bill said “the regulator” or “the Office of Rail Regulation”, whichever was the case.

I am not in any way denigrating the work done by the Office of Rail Regulation; in my view it is one of the most effective regulators, although perhaps it does not have to meet a very high standard when you think of Ofgem, Ofwat and Of-everything else—some of them are doing a very poor job. The ORR has driven up standards in the industry quite considerably, and it is a safety regulator as well. If the Minister can give me reasons why the alterations to the wording that I have suggested cannot be agreed, will she give me a view as to whether it would not be better to change the title of the Office of Rail Regulation to something like the office of transport regulation? I beg to move.

[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, I agree with much of what the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, has said, but of course the problem with the Bill is that under the Government’s current proposals the Office of Rail Regulation—perhaps with a better name—will be not a regulator but simply a monitor. There is no equivalence between the ORR’s relationship to the railways and what is currently proposed. We will come to one of my amendments later on that would allow some degree of regulation of quality, standards, the performance of the road network and road safety. At the moment, though, that is not what the Government envisage, and I would hope that the Minister would explain why. As the noble Lord has indicated, equivalence in our strategic network would appear to be common sense.

[Lord Berkeley]

My Lords, I also support these amendments. It is very difficult to see how the Secretary of State can fine himself, which is effectively what will be happening. As we know, that actually would not happen because long before it got to that stage—not that we know how it will get there, because that appears in Clause 5(2) and we have not seen the documents yet—the people running the SHC will get the sack, they will be told to change their policy in order that they comply with the road investment strategy or they will comply with the directions and guidance. So to some extent I think that this clause is a complete waste of time, although it would be nice to see what the Secretary of State said about the circumstances that may require the payment of a fine.

I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, and my noble friend Lord Whitty that we need to debate in more detail why this is not done by an independent regulator. Independence is the answer, and the independent rail regulator has the trust of the industry and, I think, of government; I am not sure about the other regulators, but we are talking about the ORR today. If it had those powers and it could use them, everybody would feel very happy that it had looked at the expenditure, efficiency, safety and everything else to do with the highways and come to an independent conclusion.

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Moved by

[Lord Whitty]

41: Clause 8, page 5, line 24, at end insert—
“( ) In all enactments the Passengers’ Council shall henceforth be renamed the “Passenger and Road Users’ Council”.”

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[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, I will be brief on this amendment because the main discussion of Passenger Focus is in the next group of amendments. My amendment is simply about the name. I prefer my formulation to that of my noble friends Lord Berkeley and Lord Judd, because my amendment makes it clear that it is actually the users—the consumers—of these services who are represented by the council. I think that that point is more ambiguous in the title they are proposing. We need a new name, so I commend my formulation and beg to move.

[Lord Berkeley]

I am going to confuse the Committee because my Amendment 42, which we will come on to shortly, suggests that the name should be the transport infrastructure and services council. However, after I tabled this amendment I had a discussion with the chief executive of the Rail Passengers’ Council, who said that a much better name than anything anyone has suggested before, including the Government, was the transport users’ council. I will just throw that into the ring and see what the Minister and other noble Lords think of it.

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[Lord Whitty]

I think that the Minister has been very clear in her latest remarks, but the point that I would make is that both the legal name and what eventually becomes the brand name have to convey the scope of the body. I do not mind when it happens or whether it is done by primary or secondary legislation—although I would prefer primary legislation—but the legal name at the end of this process must reflect something broader than “Passengers’ Council”. I am happy to leave it to the Minister and her colleagues to work their way through what is, as my noble friend said, quite a long legislative programme before we get to that point—if necessary, leaving it to secondary legislation, but it would be nicer if it were in the Bill. It needs a comprehensive legal title. The Government must then go on to ask the organisation to find out what the best public name—brand name—would be.

If I may reminisce slightly, I was the chair of a quango which had to find a new name—unfortunately, the Government have abolished it now, but there we go. It was the old National Consumer Council, transformed by the 2006 Act. At the first meeting of the governing body, we had to decide what the new name would be. Two possibilities were advocated by my colleagues following a presentation by one of these branding companies—in those days, quangos were allowed to spend a certain amount of money. It came down to whether it should be called “Consumer Matters”—double entendre—or Consumer Focus. As chair, I said that I not like either name. “Consumer Matters” sounded as though it was an entry in a filing system and Consumer Focus sounded like a Lib Dem leaflet. However, noble Lords opposite will be pleased to hear that the majority of my board went for Consumer Focus. We went through a proper branding exercise. It is important to leave that aspect of it to the newly enlarged council.

At the end of this process, I would like the legal name to indicate the real scope and Passengers’ Council does not do that. However, for the moment I withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 41 withdrawn.

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[Lord Berkeley]

My Lords, I do not want to prolong this discussion for much longer, but some of us, in setting out a role for the Passengers’ Council, are trying to ensure that it produces the right data and looks at alternative options before the company goes ahead and develops new roads. With regard to the planning system, I do not believe that the Passengers’ Council should have a role at all, but I believe that it has a role in producing the data to justify—or not—what gets done and to look at alternatives.

[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, I have tabled two amendments but I want to comment briefly on what has been said. I find myself slightly between the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, and my noble friend Lord Judd. As Roads Minister for three and a half years in the last days of Swampy, I know what the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin, is talking about. We have to separate out the planning process from the monitoring of the operational process. On the other hand, I agree with my noble friend Lord Judd that when we are talking about users of the road network, we are talking not only about the people who that day happen to be driving a car or a lorry on that network, but also about all the people who depend on that network or whose premises and lives are affected by it. We therefore need to interpret “road user” in the broadest possible sense. Without straying into the planning system, I think that some of what my noble friend said should be reflected in the Bill.

My two amendments deal with different issues. Amendment 47 refers to the setting up a complaints system. One of the most effective jobs of Passenger Focus in relation to rail, and latterly buses, has been in dealing with a complaints system. Its effort has pushed the responsibility for dealing with complaints back on the railway and bus companies. It is there to pick up what those companies failed to do in terms of complaints. Similarly, we have never had the equivalent system in relation to strategic roads. It is important that a complaints system is seen as one of the responsibilities of whatever we eventually call the Passengers’ Council.

My second amendment is a probing amendment, which I will not press. It relates to Clause 8(6), which refers to a relationship between the Passengers’ Council and local authority rights. It says that the new consumer body could have responsibility for matters relating to local authority roads if the local authority asks it to. That is a bit cock-eyed. Either we make it responsible for complaints about all local authority roads, which I do not really want to do, although my amendment would have that effect, or we leave it as the user body for the strategic road network, which would be tidier. After all, complaints about roads for which the local authority is responsible need to be dealt with largely within the local authority context. There is plenty of scope for complaints to local councils about local authority roads.

If some local authorities want the Passengers’ Council to be there for consumers but others do not, there will be confusion. My local road, the A30, in 10 miles goes through Wiltshire, Dorset and Somerset. If only one of those councils agrees that the Passengers’ Council should be the consumer body, we would have to pinpoint exactly where the complaint arose—over a traffic jam, police incident, or whatever—and we would end up with a patchwork of bodies. Some councils would say that the Passengers’ Council was responsible and would shove off all complaints to it, while others would continue to deal with the complaints in their highways departments. Subsection (6) extends the Passengers’ Council’s role into local authority roads, which may be a step too far. My amendment should probably have been worded differently, but I want to hear what the Minister says in her summing up.

[Baroness Kramer]

My Lords, in this set of amendments we are dealing with the watchdog. We will come on to the monitor in the following clause, so I shall try to narrow what I say to the watchdog role and the body that legally today is known as the Passengers’ Council, or whatever name it chooses for the future.

I think that we have made it absolutely clear that the Passengers’ Council, or “Road User Focus”, or whatever name it chooses as its trading name, will deal with the role identified in the Bill. It anticipates having to represent and to be a voice for that very wide range of users that we have described in the past few minutes of our discussion. I believe that the noble Lord, Lord Judd, and others were suggesting that we apply it to non-users and to surrounding communities. We are then back in the territory where it is hard for a group to be a voice for users. That is necessary in the kind of structure that we have here with the SHC. In other parts of the Bill, it is clear that there is an important role for the SHC itself to be working closely with local authorities. That was reinforced in some of the agreements that have been drawn up and were announced on Monday between the Highways Agency and local enterprise partnerships, which will carry over into the role of the SHC. We have all kinds of mechanisms, including a great deal of detail, about how environmental issues will be addressed and how the SHC will relate to local authorities. There will undoubtedly be implications that come out of the RIS.

Therefore, I see the role of watchdog as being very much a voice for the road user. As I read the clauses here, if there were issues such as modal shift, I think that that would be an area that the Passengers’ Council, in whatever guise it has for these services, could, if it chose to do so, explore and advise on, but very much from the perspective of the road user.

The noble Lord, Lord Whitty, asked about complaints. At present, complaints go to the Highways Agency, and our concept is that that will carry on and pass through to the new SHC. When a body acts as the SHC will be doing, it is important that complaints go directly to it. It must hear those complaints, it must be aware of them and it must take them on board. It must not be allowed, as it were, to offload that responsibility to a watchdog. “Road User Focus”, or whatever it is called, will be able to see through to those complaints so that it can access the data and use them in its work. However, I very much want to see the complaints going directly to the SHC because that will be one of the most important ways of ensuring that it provides the service that is needed.

[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, perhaps I may just clarify that. It will certainly be the company’s first responsibility to deal with complaints. In the case of the railways, you complain to South West Trains and, if it fails to deal with your complaint effectively, you can complain to Passenger Focus. It is the equivalent of that that I am looking for.

[Baroness Kramer]

My understanding is that “Road User Focus” will be able to see right through to the complaints to see what they are and whether they are being appropriately handled. At the moment, complaints are not a large issue for the Highways Agency. Of all the letters sent to it last year—I do not have the total number, unfortunately—only 16 needed outside help in resolving them, which represented about 2% of the letters received. So it has a good complaints system in place and a good track record on resolution, and that will pass over to the new company. However, as I said, it is important that the watchdog should be able to see all the way through that process. I am sure that it will choose how it engages with that—it is not constrained by the language in Clause 8.

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Moved by

[Lord Whitty]

43: Clause 8, page 5, line 25, after “must” insert “establish a capacity to”

[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendment 45. Amendment 43 deals with the role of the Passengers’ Council—however in future designated—and the fact that it had initially dealt solely with railways. There was once a proposal to extend it to air passenger transport, which was dropped, but it has been extended to buses. It has developed expertise in those two areas of public transport. It is now dealing with a much wider user group, even if the Minister is reluctant to go down the route of widening it to the whole community, as proposed by my noble friend Lord Judd. It will have to develop capacity to deal with a whole different user group, and that needs to be reflected here. It is also important that the Government commit to finding a way to finance that extension.

Unusually, when the railways were privatised, the taxpayer paid for the user representative body. That was also extended when its remit was extended to buses. In other industries, consumer bodies have an allocation via the licence fee or otherwise. I do not mind which way the Government fund it, but it seems to me important that it is required in legislation, and that it is done over a reasonably lengthy period—in other words, that the new, broader organisation does not have to wait each year to know what its allocation will be next year. There will need to be an allocation at least every three years either by requiring a payment from the licence fee or whatever else, which would be the equivalent of the situation in water or in energy, or by making an allocation out of general taxation. That requirement should be in the Bill, as should be the Government’s preferred method of funding. That will give the conceived stability to the representatives of road users. I beg to move.

[Baroness Kramer]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, is absolutely right that Passenger Focus also works on buses, coaches and trams. In my enthusiasm I think I said it focuses on rail, but of course all those passengers are part of its work. However, I point out that all those activities are funded in non-specific terms.

Passenger Focus is given sufficient funds to discharge all its responsibilities and we expect it to do exactly the same for roads. It is not usual for government to make commitments of this kind in statute and we struggle to see why this should be a special case. To assure your Lordships in more practical terms, officials in the department are already making arrangements for a long-term funding settlement. I would expect sufficient funds to be made available for “Road User Focus” to represent road users of all types effectively.

With the assurance that the same kind of approach would be used as we already use for Passenger Focus and that it would be funded by the Government, not by the industry, I ask the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, to withdraw the amendment.

[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, at least we have on the record the assurance that it will be funded—and, one hopes, on a forward-looking basis. I will consider the implications of that but, for the moment, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 43 withdrawn.

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Moved by

[Lord Whitty]

53: Clause 9, page 6, line 20, at end insert—
“(c) proposing regulations and enforcement powers governing the activities of the Strategic Highways Company”

[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendment 58 in this group.

The first amendment is to make clear that the ORR, or whatever we end up calling it, will be a regulator as well as simply a monitor. I said earlier that we needed something equivalent to the ORR, which monitors the rail network, to be applied to the road system. There are areas of a strategic road system that need to be regulated. They include safety records—I declare my interest as chair of the Road Safety Foundation. They also include environmental performance in relation to all sorts of things such as carbon emissions, air pollution, water runoff and so on. Someone needs to be regulating specifically the strategic network, which is seen increasingly as a system. It has hitherto been subject to either general regulation or specific regulation by the Department for Transport.

It is important that the new body, as it extends its role into roads, is seen to have as powerful a leverage in that area as the ORR does in rail, to achieve the excellent levels of safety that we have achieved in the railway system in recent years and to ensure that the strategic network continues to make substantial improvements in the safety record on the highways network. If the Government maintain their line that the monitor is not a regulator, then it is not just a question of symmetry between the different modes but a question of the effectiveness of the Government’s role in relation to the strategic transportation system within England. The ORR-plus needs to be given that clear role.

As to my second amendment, I suspect that I shall get from the Minister the same answer that I received in relation to the Passengers’ Council’s funding. It is important, though, to recognise that this situation is unusual. In energy, water and telecoms the money comes from the regulated industry. In her response on the issue of funding for the Passengers’ Council-plus, the Minister said that it would come from the Government. I assume that I am going to get the same answer in relation to the regulator/monitor.

It is important for the Government to recognise that this is unusual, and someone sitting in the Treasury probably realises that. On reflection, I still think that this should probably be a matter for the user organisation, the watchdog, if such a provision were to be written into the legislation. Some future Chancellor, of whatever party, may ask: “Why are we, the taxpayer, paying for this in relation to transport, when in all the other regulated sectors it is the industry that pays for it?”. In the great scheme of things, the Treasury, wearing another hat, regards all this as taxation because it is a mandated levy on the industry, but in terms of the impact on the general expenditure of the Government it is in a different category. It would therefore be useful not only to have on the record the Minister saying that that is how this body will be funded but, for added certainty, to put something like that in the Bill. I beg to move.

[Lord Davies of Oldham]

My Lords, I have amendments grouped with those of my noble friend Lord Whitty, and I agree with a great deal of what he has just said.

Amendment 54 is my chief amendment and is designed to ensure that the monitor focuses not simply on the financial cost of the strategic highways company’s activities—that is, the bill to the taxpayer for the SHC—but on its wider non-monetisation impacts such as landscape, biodiversity and social distribution. We need breadth to the monitor’s analysis of the performance of the company. The text is based on guidance in the Treasury Green Book on appraisal, so I am merely suggesting that where the Treasury thinks that the proper appraisal of an activity should include these features, I want them to be included when considering the SHC.

The other amendment in the group is a minor one about removing all exemptions in documents. We do not see why these powers should be restricted in the documents that are made available, but that is a relatively minor aspect. Amendment 54, however, is of considerable import.

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On that basis, I hope that the noble Lord will feel happy to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, I have found this discussion a little bizarre. Earlier, I felt that my noble friend Lord Hanworth—obviously very unusually for him—exaggerated the difference between the ideologies of the Government and of this side, but in fact, taking what the Minister has just said, he was understating the case. We are looking for a more efficient strategic transport system and the Minister is resisting any degree of integration of the different parts of that system, or even the application of the same criteria to the different parts of that system.

These amendments, and my amendment at the beginning, are about expanding the ORR. She is right to say that Ministers set the policy, but it is also the job of the regulator to ensure that that policy is carried out. Whether you call it a regulator or a monitor, that is its job. If we are looking to have the best outcome at the lowest cost, it is the job of the monitor/regulator to ensure that that is what is being achieved, and to do that you have to look at both modes. As far as possible, you have to have the equivalent approach to both modes, given the differences that the Minister rightly outlines in the ways in which the two sides operate.

If, for example, there is a proposition for expenditure on improving the A303—one of my favourite roads, as noble Lords know—and the M5 to the south-west, it is a nonsense to do that in strategic terms without also looking at the capacity of the various routes from London or Bristol to Exeter. If you are looking at the M6, it is daft to look at that without also looking at the west coast main line north of Crewe. If you are looking to make maximum return, from the point of view of a road user, a rail passenger or government expenditure on the rail network, then you ought to be bringing together both aspects. I thought that the Government’s logic in setting up the ORR to cover both aspects was exactly that, but I am now confused.

[Baroness Kramer]

For clarity, is the noble Lord saying that it is his advice to his party that those decisions should be transferred to the ORR rather than remaining with the Secretary of State and the Government of the day?

[Lord Whitty]

No, my Lords, I am saying that the policy has to be decided by the Secretary of State. I would query if the Secretary of State always has to be involved in deciding whether or not we are going to put another two miles on a particular road junction because that could probably be devolved further down the line, but leaving that aside, the Secretary of State sets the policy and the Treasury gives him the taxpayers’ contribution to that policy. However, an expanded ORR would see that it was carried out on both the rail side and on the road side, in corridors in both modes, and with interconnections between them at various key points on the strategic network. One of the things that is sadly lacking in our transport system is intermodal transfer. I would actually include access to ports and airports within that too, if we were doing a comprehensive job.

I thought that the whole point of hiving off the Highways Agency and giving responsibility for its regulation to the ORR was a move in that direction, but the Minister seems to be unravelling all that and saying, “We don’t need any of that. That is far too many steps too far. Railways are completely different from roads. We have to consider them in two different frameworks”. I would have thought that in terms of efficiency of return on taxpayers’ contributions, you would have to look at them together. There are different levels of policymaking and delivery, but this is actually an opportunity for increasing the degree of integration and of comprehensiveness, and therefore for increasing the return to the taxpayer and the transport user of expenditure on this area.

[Lord Bradshaw]

In the letter that the Minister sent me about practice in Europe, she makes reference to Sweden. Rather underlining the points that the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, has just made, reference is made in the letter to a thing called Trafikverket. The Swedish Government set the long-term aims and provide the funding, and Trafikverket is expected to deliver them. The point is that Trafikverket is located in Borlänge in the north of Sweden in the same offices as Banverket, which looks after and regulates the railways in Sweden. They work together to the same criteria.

[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, perhaps our Swedish colleagues can show us the way, and I bow to the knowledge of the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, about the Swedish position. I have read the letter from the noble Baroness about the overseas experience, none of which seems to be entirely congruent with what is being proposed here, but nevertheless it is instructive in this particular instance.

My relatively humble amendment proposes that the two should be considered together, but clearly the Government’s thinking has not yet developed that far and is not reflected to that extent in this Bill. I can only hope that an alternative Government might take it a bit further, if that is the legacy we are bequeathed. For the moment, however, with some regret I will have to accept that the Minister is not going to be persuaded to go down that road, or indeed that railway, tonight.

Amendment 53 withdrawn.

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Moved by

[Lord Whitty]

59: Clause 10, page 7, line 11, at end insert—
“( ) Where a transfer involves staff or obligations and liabilities to staff, either the Transfer of Undertakings provisions shall apply or equivalent provisions will apply.”

[Lord Whitty]

I am sure that the Minister will have no difficulty in accepting Amendment 59 because I think she said in reply to one of the first of our amendments that for any transfer of staff out of the Highways Agency, the DfT remit to civil servants would be covered by TUPE or its equivalent. For reassurance to those who are involved in this, it would be jolly useful if that was reflected in the Bill. I say that because there is some anxiety and different situations have applied in a few—not many—as a consequence of the Public Bodies Act 2011. It should be made clear that that will be the criterion. It would provide a reassurance to the staff and their trade union if it were in the Bill. I beg to move.

[Baroness Kramer]

My Lords, I will resist this being put into the Bill because it will be in the supporting documents. The transfer is an important stage of setting up the strategic highways company. Discussions with staff representatives relating to the transfer of staff have already begun and, subject to the will of Parliament and Royal Assent, it is envisaged that staff will transfer to the new company from 1 April 2015. The Government have already stated that the terms and conditions of employment of those staff who transfer into the company will be protected in accordance with wider Government policy and practice on staff transfers within the public sector through COSOP, under which the Government are expected to apply the principles of TUPE. I can therefore reassure the noble Lord that the terms and conditions of employment of any staff being transferred from the Highways Agency to the new company are protected.

Furthermore, under the Public Service Pensions Act 2013, public service workers who are transferred out of the Civil Service will be able to remain members of the civil service pension scheme. Most Highways Agency staff are in the Principal Civil Service Pension Scheme. I hope that that is sufficient reassurance for noble Lords and I therefore invite the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, to withdraw the amendment.

[Lord Whitty]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for putting that assurance on the record so clearly. I never quite understand why Ministers resist putting such provisions in a Bill. This is a fairly substantial piece of legislation which includes all sorts of things, but the one thing which is to be omitted is an assurance for those people who will be most directly and immediately affected by the changes to the institutional structure. I regret the continuing resistance by Ministers to setting this out in the Bill, but I accept that that is the way things are at the moment. With the Minister’s assurance, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 59 withdrawn.