Defending Against Piracy (UK Ships)

Mike Penning Excerpts

Tuesday 6th December 2011 Written Statements

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

The rise in the number of incidents involving pirates in certain parts of the world has highlighted the need to ensure UK-flagged vessels are able to adequately protect themselves against such threats. Evidence shows that ships with armed guards are less likely to be attacked and taken for ransom, and the House will be aware that the Prime Minister confirmed last month that the Government now recognise the use of private armed guards as an option to protect UK registered ships and their crews from acts of piracy. This applies in exceptional circumstances as defined below:

when the ship is transiting the high seas throughout the high-risk area (an area bounded by Suez and the straights of Hormuz to the north, 10°S and 78°E); and

the latest “Best Management Practices” is being followed fully but, on its own, is not deemed by the shipping company and the ship’s master as sufficient to protect against acts of piracy; and

the use of armed guards is assessed to reduce the risk to the lives and well-being of those onboard the ship.

I am therefore today, publishing interim guidance to shipping companies on the use of armed guards onboard UK flagged ships. This guidance covers, among other things, the factors to be included in the risk assessment, advice on selecting a private security company, and a requirement for the shipping company to produce a counter-piracy plan and submit a copy to my Department.

A private security company (PSC) employed to put armed guards on board UK ships will require authorisation from the Home Office for possession of any prohibited firearms as defined in the Firearms Act 1968 (as amended). Checks will be carried out by the Home Office and police into the PSC and its personnel before an authorisation is granted.

The guidance to shipping companies and the Home Office process for authorising the possession of prohibited firearms are both interim and will be reviewed within 12 months so that they reflect continuing national and international work to ensure high standards in the provision of armed guards in the maritime domain.

HGV Wheels (Safety)

Mike Penning Excerpts

Tuesday 29th November 2011 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

It is a pleasure to speak under your chairmanship on this important day, Mr Scott. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Wythenshawe and Sale East (Paul Goggins) on securing the debate, although I am slightly disappointed by his saying that I have not engaged. We had the previous debate in this Chamber, but before the debate we had meetings in my office; I think that that is engagement. I have said throughout that as the Minister—the right hon. Gentleman used to be a Minister himself—I have to have an evidence base to go forward. In the letter to him, I was trying to be as honest as possible: I did not have a slot in my diary between now and Christmas, and that is why I said that at this stage I cannot see him; I could have given him a date after Christmas, but I thought that such a long delay would have been an insult to him. However, like any other colleague, he can stop me at any time and I will engage at any time. My officials are also engaging.

It is important to talk about who is representing whom in the very important UK logistics industry. The Freight Transport Association and the Road Haulage Association, whose representatives I meet very regularly and with whom I have a very good rapport, have not raised this issue with me once. I was at a major haulier’s yesterday—in fact, I was going along the A13 in Essex in a 38-tonne articulated truck. I make those visits so that I can engage with the industry. I was feeling slightly jealous yesterday because I have only a class 2 licence, not a class 1. I have been very close to this issue for most of my career, especially when I had a licence in operation myself.

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. I am going to quote the 0.0006% figure. I will answer the specific points he raised, but if anything has changed the position since the previous Adjournment debate—if more evidence has emerged—of course we will look at it and at the specific details to which we have alluded.

The right hon. Gentleman sent me a photograph of a damaged wheel. One of the facts I wanted to ascertain was when that vehicle was last tested, because the crack should and would have been brought up in the test. It is illegal to have that sort of damage on a vehicle, as he knows, and it is illegal to run the vehicle with it. The operator’s licence would be affected should they run a damaged vehicle; it is an offence under the Road Traffic Act 1988 as well as under the operator’s licence. However, the crack would have been picked up at the annual check. Unlike cars—we are to review the situation of cars in relation to MOTs—lorries are checked annually from when they are new.

I would like to know, and I would have hoped that the right hon. Gentleman might have told me because he was using this as evidence today, what vehicle the wheel came off and when the vehicle last had a check. It could have been the case that the damaged wheel on that vehicle was picked up and then removed, as we would all expect—so that it was not on the road at all.

Killer wheels are an interesting topic. The question of copies or snides has been around for a long time, particularly regarding aluminium wheels on cars. The failure rate for aluminium wheels, if they are not constructed right, has worried me for many years. The focus is often on design rather than function—people want them to look flash. That is something that we are looking at robustly, but legislation already exists to make sure that that sort of thing does not happen again. If the manufacturers are picking up copies being brought into the country, I assure the right hon. Gentleman that we will work with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills on that.

The ITV report on potholes was interesting, because there are myriad reasons why a wheel could fail. Those who follow Formula 1 will know that during the race before last, a wheel failed on the first corner; there was an instantaneous puncture. Central Government have invested a huge amount of money in repairing potholes, which is why the number of potholes is as low as the report suggested. The right hon. Gentleman will have to wait until later today for further announcements on road infrastructure. It is absolutely right to say that failures take place when vehicles hit potholes or hit the kerb. I had a failure in an aluminium wheel when I attempted a U-turn, misjudged it and caught the wheel wrongly on the kerb. Not only did the tyre give way but the aluminium wheel broke.

[Paul Goggins]

During the first five minutes of the Minister’s speech he has not even glanced at his folder, which demonstrates both his enthusiasm for road safety and the fact that he is completely on top of his brief. He has responded to the three pieces of evidence that I gave him without looking at a note, so he clearly has the information at his fingertips.

If the hon. Gentleman had written to me on 9 November to say that he was dealing with a lot of pressing matters and would not be able to meet me until the new year, I would have understood and accepted that. I would have done so reluctantly, because before Christmas would have been better, but if he makes that offer again this morning I will be happy to accept.

[Mike Penning]

I apologise for the fact that I am not reading the speech that was written for me—I rarely do—but I hope that I am on top of my brief. Road safety is paramount for me, especially as I come from a fire service background. While I was in the fire service, I attended road traffic collisions regularly as the driver of a rescue vehicle. I never once encountered an incident in which the wheel had failed, although there were lots of other problems, particularly on some older cars where the hub structure had failed. In the evidence that we have looked at, which I will not read out, there were 23 failures over a 15-year period, but such problems were often due partly to accidents where wheels had been struck and damaged.

I will write to the right hon. Gentleman in the very near future and offer him a slot after Christmas. I think that something positive has come out not only of today’s debate but of my saying no the last time we met in this Chamber, because the trade associations have stepped up to the plate. Rather than Ministers telling people what to do, the right approach is often for the industry to realise that it has a responsibility as well and that reform is needed.

There might be a certain amount of semantics on the part of both myself and the right hon. Gentleman about the wording of the letter and who the official responsible for these issues is, but the simple answer is that the buck stops with me. If the trade associations want to present evidence to me, rather than an official within VOSA, they can do so and I will be more than happy to provide that point of contact. This is not only about the manufacturer; if the failure rates are increasing, and that is what this is all about—I am not disputing that one way or the other because, frankly, we do not know, and there is no point disputing something that is not disputable—do I still want there to be a second-hand market? I do, because that is important for people who cannot afford to buy brand-new wheels every time, but those wheels must be safe. The operators have a responsibility to make sure that that happens, and I do not want to take that responsibility away from them.

When I was in that truck yesterday, I felt comfortable not because it was brand spanking new—it was not; it was about 18 months old—but because of the robustness of the legislation governing VOSA and its testing regimes. I have been at the side of many a road with the new VOSA testing and enforcement officers, and I know how remarkable the current equipment is. We can estimate the weight on an axle while the vehicle is travelling at 56 mph down the motorway; we can pull it over and put it on a weighbridge, and we know accurately what the result will be. When inspections take place, on overseas vehicles as well as our own, checks on wheels and brakes are carried out, there and then, to the best of the officers’ ability. Obviously, most of the weigh stations do not have a pit facility.

If the right hon. Gentleman—let me call him my right hon. Friend—has called this debate as a direct reaction to my letter, he should have pulled me over in the Tea Room, where I would have addressed the matter straight away and we would have had a meeting after Christmas. He will understand, because he was a Minister himself, why I do not like making appointments way into the future. Events take over and I might not even be at the Department any more; someone else may be doing this job if we go too far past Christmas, or even before Christmas.

[Paul Goggins]

I sincerely hope that the Minister is still in his position in the new year, not only because he has now promised me a meeting, but because he is clearly on top of his brief and doing a good job. I commend him for that. He has mentioned twice that I was a Minister, which I was for seven years, and I never, ever refused a meeting with a Member of Parliament. The message that I am sending to the Minister and the Government is that when Members of Parliament are pursuing issues that concern them and their constituents and they want to meet Ministers, it should be an absolute given that those meetings take place. Of course Ministers are always busy, but their busy diaries must not get in the way of their fundamental accountability to MPs and to Parliament.

[Mike Penning]

I have a reputation in the House for being approachable, and this is the first time that I have ever been reprimanded by a senior Member. My letter was written in the best possible faith; a series of events to do with lots of things, which I will not go into now, meant that I could not guarantee a slot that I would be able to hold on to. The worst thing in the world is to make an appointment and cancel it, but that is what tends to happen. When I was in opposition, promises were made to me and they were not kept. If I make a promise, wherever possible and subject to business, I keep it, so the right hon. Gentleman and I will meet. I hope that the trade associations will do what they said they will do—that they will get the submissions together and come as a united body to present their evidence. That will allow me to go away and ask why we have certain failure rates coming from all the different expert bodies mentioned in the speech that I have not used, and to compare that with what is happening on the front line.

Whatever happens, I will not increase the burden on businesses. I think that the haulage industry, with the margins that it works on, is already heavily burdened, and I am trying to take some of that burden away. Road safety is paramount for me, but operators have responsibilities, which they must never forget.

Dartford-Thurrock River Crossing (Changes)

Mike Penning Excerpts

Thursday 24th November 2011 Written Statements

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

On the 30 June the Department for Transport launched a consultation on proposals to change the charging regime at the Dartford-Thurrock River Crossing. The consultation closed on 23 September.

The consultation made reference to increasing the charges during November 2011 and again in April 2012.

I am pleased with the number of responses received and the level of engagement from local communities. In recognition of the number of representations made and to allow the Department time to carefully consider the responses further, I can advise that there will be no increase in either November 2011 or April 2012.

A final decision on the timing of future rises and a full response to the consultation will, subject to Cabinet Committee clearance, be announced early next year.

Coastguard Modernisation

Mike Penning Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd November 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

With your permission, Mr Speaker, I should like to make a statement on the Government’s final decisions about coastguard modernisation in the light of responses received to the second round of consultation, which ended on 6 October 2011.

I should first like to remind the House that the plans for coastguard modernisation announced by my right hon. Friend the Member for Runnymede and Weybridge (Mr Hammond) in his statement on 14 July, following the first round of consultation, are not about altering the arrangements for front-line rescue services around our coasts. Rescue activities will continue to be carried out as they are today by the 3,500 community volunteers in the Coastguard Rescue Service; the lifeboats operated by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution; independent lifeboats operated by volunteer groups; and our search and rescue helicopters. The bravery and commitment shown by those providing front-line services have served this country well and will continue to do so.

The plans we have announced specifically include an increase in the number of regular coastguard officers who provide operational leadership to support the 3,500 volunteers in the Coastguard Rescue Service, whom I mentioned. These plans therefore reflect the importance we attach to continuing the delivery of a first-class local rescue service directly serving citizens and recreational mariners.

The decision announced on 14 July, and the further details I am announcing today, are about modernising the coastguard co-ordination function only. Modernisation is needed to address the limited resilience of current rescue co-ordination arrangements, which have changed little since the removal of the visual watch in the 1970s. Modernisation will provide the operational resilience needed; distribute work more effectively and efficiently around coastguard centres; make the most of the professional skills of our regular coastguards with levels of reward that match their responsibilities; and deliver improved support and co-ordination for our Coastguard Rescue Service and our search and rescue partners.

The original proposals, which we consulted on last December, had been discussed and developed over several years by the previous Government. We said at the outset that we would have a genuine consultation and that we expected the outcome of the process to be improved and more resilient plans.

We made it clear in July that we had listened to the views expressed in the first consultation. As a result, we announced that, in implementing a nationally networked system, we would retain more coastguard centres than originally proposed; keep all these centres operating 24/7; and retain more regular coastguard jobs. These plans will keep open at least one of each of the paired coastguard centres. Operational pairs have experience and knowledge in managing incidents across their shared geographical areas. Keeping at least one centre from each pair will therefore ensure that that experience and local knowledge is retained. In addition, as we explained in July, the operational costs of retaining the 10 centres overall plus a small centre in London will be offset by operating only one national maritime operations centre—MOC—with an unmanned back-up in Dover, rather than the two that were previously planned.

The second consultation exercise, which is what this statement is about, invited views on four specific issues: the retention of both the centres at Stornoway and Shetland and their operation on a 24/7 basis; the change to a single maritime operations centre with an unmanned back-up in Dover; the retention of Holyhead rather than its paired centre at Liverpool; and the retention of Milford Haven rather than its paired centre at Swansea.

The second consultation closed on 6 October. I should like again to thank all those who engaged in the process, including those in the service, members of the public and Members from both sides of the House. All responses were read and examined by an independent team, which has helped to develop the modernisation proposals. I am making its report on the issues identified in the consultation available today on the Maritime and Coastguard Agency website, and it will be available in the Library of the House.

Let me now turn to the specific questions we posed in the second consultation. The support for keeping open both the centres at Stornoway and on Shetland was overwhelming, so I can confirm that we will keep them both open on a 24/7 basis.

On the move to a single maritime centre, concerns were expressed about having both an unmanned centre and its back-up in the south, when they should be geographically separated, and about the possible reduction in capabilities at Aberdeen to co-ordinate oil or gas incidents if there was not to be a second main centre in Aberdeen. However, we continue to believe that with more centres remaining open on a 24/7 basis, there is sufficient cover not to need a second nationally networked system. Consequently, there will be one network in the south.

We also believe that the back-up at Dover is sufficiently distant from the maritime operations centre in the Portsmouth-Southampton area—I shall return to that later—to provide the necessary resilience while minimising costs. However, we will retain additional specialist staff in Aberdeen to maintain the Maritime and Coastguard Agency’s close links with the oil and gas sector. Those jobs will remain.

On the choice of Holyhead rather than Liverpool, representations were received stressing the scale and proximity of maritime and tourist activities at both locations; questioning the importance of the Welsh language considerations highlighted in the first consultation; and concerning the running-cost advantages and higher disposal costs for Liverpool. We considered the responses carefully, but as we made clear in July, we have identified no operational or financial reasons for preferring one location to the other. In particular there are no significant differences in running costs.

In the light of comments in the first consultation, it is also our view that familiarity with Welsh place names, rather than speaking Welsh, must be an important consideration supporting the retention of Holyhead. As a result, I have concluded that Holyhead should form part of the nationally networked system and that the co-ordination function at Liverpool will close. We plan to maintain a marine office, coastguard rescue team, coastal operational hub and a radio mast at the Liverpool site.

Representations were also received about the proximity, particularly of maritime activities, at Milford Haven and Swansea. The representations concerned the perceived risks of having a centre so close to liquefied natural gas terminals at Milford Haven; better transport links in Swansea; and the wider potential recruitment pool in the Swansea area. I must reiterate, however, that within the nationally networked system, which will co-ordinate incidents in this area, there are no operational reasons for choosing one or other of these sites. Similarly, as was explained in July, we are satisfied that there are no considerations that favour either location.

In addition, we have not recently experienced any recruitment problems at Milford Haven. As a result, I have concluded that it remains right that the choice of Milford Haven as the site for a continuing coastguard co-ordination centre should reflect the Department for Transport’s continuing substantial levels of employment in Swansea. This means that we will no longer have a coastguard co-ordination function at Swansea, but we plan that the building will remain in use as a coastal operations hub for the volunteer rescue teams. It will be at that site.

Having reached these decisions, I am today publishing a short summary document that sets out a clear blueprint for the operation of the nationally networked coastguard co-ordination service comprising a single national operations centre in the Portsmouth area—again, I shall return to that—a back-up national operations centre at Dover; and centres at the MCA sites at Humber, Aberdeen, Shetland, Stornoway, Belfast, Holyhead, Milford Haven and Falmouth. This blueprint also sets out the previously announced provisional timetable for the closure of the other existing co-ordination centres before 31 March 2015. The centre at Solent will be replaced by the new maritime operations centre. This timetable remains our best estimate of when these centres will close, although clearly it will need to be kept under review to match operational requirements.

The document also explains—and I stress this point—the strong commitment to the coastguard presence that will be retained at the existing MCA sites at Liverpool, Swansea and the Thames, even after the co-ordination centre function ends. There will be a similarly strong presence in the Clyde area, but not at the existing site.

Finally, I would like to say something about the location of the new national maritime operations centre. With the full support of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, I am pleased to inform the House that the maritime operations centre will be housed in the vacant fire control centre building in Fareham—the significance of that with a former fireman standing here will be obvious. The building’s existing facilities mean that the maritime operations centre can be established quickly, allowing for an extensive programme of tests and trials to prove and refine the new concept of operations for maritime rescue co-ordination. Those tests and trials will be an important element in addressing the understandable concerns from many professional coastguards about the operation of the new system and will ensure no reduction in capabilities in the transition period. The choice of Fareham also makes best use of the Government’s existing estate and minimises up-front costs, offering best value for money.

I understand, of course, that the closure of some existing co-ordination centres and the loss of some coastguard jobs will come as a disappointment to those directly affected. However, the decisions that I have announced today will deliver the modernised, nationally networked and fully resilient coastguard service that we require for the future, while also reducing costs. Critically, these decisions will enable us better to support our coastguard volunteers and the front-line rescue capabilities on which the public and mariners depend. I commend this statement to the House.

[Jim Fitzpatrick (Poplar and Limehouse) (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for an advance copy of his statement. I would expect no less a courtesy from a former fellow fireman, but it is especially generous coming from someone who served with the Essex brigade to someone from London. I apologise to the Minister and to you, Mr Speaker, that my hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle), the shadow Secretary of State, is not present. She has pursued the issue vigorously, as have the shadow Secretary of State for Education and the shadow Leader of the House. She is particularly frustrated at being unable to be here today, especially as her own station is to close.

I also thank the Minister for making today’s statement, ending the prolonged concern and uncertainty in coastguard communities. These exercises take time, and I know that the Minister made a considerable personal effort in travelling to various parts of the country to meet and engage with staff and others. That is to his credit. He will also have listened to the respected chief executive of the MCA, Sir Alan Massey, and the highly regarded chief coastguard, Rod Johnson. I, too, would like to take this opportunity to express our support for them and the entire coastguard service, which so professionally co-ordinates the first-class search and rescue capability around our coast.

As a member of the Worshipful Company of Shipwrights, as former shipping Minister and now as shadow shipping Minister, I, like the Minister, am proud to wear the red ensign badge, in solidarity with and respect for British shipping in all its aspects. I have no doubt that the Minister has done his best within the limits set by the Treasury and his departmental budget; but equally, I have no doubt that these proposals are at least partly driven by financial constraints. He knows the concerns out there about shipping safety owing to the loss of Nimrods, the ending of the emergency towing vessel contract and the outstanding review of the air-sea search and rescue service. The Select Committee on Transport, under the excellent chairmanship of my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman), echoed that concern when it said:

“The evidence…raises serious concerns that safety will be jeopardised if these proposals proceed.”

In that case the Government were right to look again and amend their original proposals.

I would be grateful if the Minister responded to a few questions. In the original plan he envisaged two operational centres, we assumed for resilience. Can he reassure the House that the non-staffed back-up will be able to do the job if the main centre crashes? Can he also say how quickly it would be up and running under such circumstances? Can he tell us how many coastguards will remain in full-time employment after this modernisation programme? I think he said that there would be more, but I assume that that is against the original consultation document, not the present establishment. Part of our review in government was about addressing low pay among coastguards historically, compared with similar staff, with similar duties, in the other emergency services. Given that remaining staff will be undertaking more work with more responsibilities and that we anticipate they will need to be upskilled, will this modernisation address that historic anomaly? My last question is when we can expect a statement on the future of the air-sea search and rescue service.

In conclusion, we welcome the Minister’s acceptance of the need to keep both Shetland and Stornoway, and we are relieved that the Department proposes 24/7 cover at all the remaining stations. His decision to retain one of each pair of twinned stations is an acknowledgement that the question of local knowledge weighed heavily on him and his officials. I am sure he will understand, however, that in a number of communities out there now, there will be real disappointment and even anger today. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s answers.

[Mike Penning]

I thank my friend for his comments: we agree on most things, but occasionally disagree; perhaps we will disagree a little bit today. Let me answer the hon. Gentleman’s four specific questions.

In the original proposal, which we inherited from the previous Administration, two MOCs were required, not least because the majority of the stations would have gone part time. They are no longer going part time; they are 24/7, so the resilience within the system, which is not there today, will give us the communications resilience that we need. If we need to move into the unmanned MOC we will do so. We looked at this carefully and found that in 99.9% of cases we would not have to do this, even if the MOC went down initially, because the other stations will pick it up, and we are moving towards the Dover MOC.

Pay is a real issue: £13,500 as a basic salary for someone working in the emergency services is a disgrace. I know that the shadow Minister looked at this carefully when he was in my position, which is why the original proposals were on his former desk and on the desk of the Minister before him and the one before that. We have done something about it so that we have pay, conditions and promotion opportunities for the people who serve so well.

In the original proposals I inherited, coastguard staffing levels would have gone down to 244. Under the proposals I have announced today, the staffing level will be 314. The shadow Minister will have to wait for the Secretary of State to make her announcement on search and rescue helicopters.

[Sheryll Murray (South East Cornwall) (Con)]

The Prime Minister told this House on 30 March:

“We want to make changes only if they improve coastguard support that people in fishing communities and elsewhere get…If that is not the case, we will obviously have to reconsider reforms”.—[Official Report, 30 March 2011; Vol. 526, c. 336.]

If, as many sea users at all levels from rear admirals to professional yachtsmen believe, the trial of a new control centre demonstrates the loss of local knowledge to be an added danger to any sea user, will the Minister reconsider his plans for closing any coastguard co-ordination centres, as the Prime Minister has already mentioned?

[Mike Penning]

I thank my hon. Friend for her important question. One point in having Fareham open so early is that we will be able to trial the new system early, which will mean that no centres will close before the robustness of the system is demonstrated. Should there be any blips in the system, I can assure my hon. Friend that no station will close until we have the level of resilience that we do not have today.

[Gemma Doyle (West Dunbartonshire) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Minister’s proposals mean a cut in staffing levels covering the Clyde area of 56% in comparison with a UK average cut of 33%. I see nothing in the statement that changes that. Why does the Minister think that the Clyde, which is the busiest area for call-out, should have a disproportionately higher cut in staffing?

[Mike Penning]

I am sorry if I misled the hon. Lady, but Clyde will close as a co-ordination centre. It is already paired with Belfast. Belfast regularly covers the resilience and has the local knowledge that is necessary. That is why we took the decision to keep one of every pair open. I understand that it is sad for the hon. Lady, but there will be coastguards working in the Clyde area, although it will not be a co-ordination centre.

[Mr Charles Kennedy (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (LD)]

Whilst welcoming the sensible concessions made, not least with regard to the west coast, the Minches and the northern waters—I have to say that the earlier suggestions flew in the face of all common sense—I ask the Minister whether he will none the less accept that there is a considerable element of gamble here. Given the warnings from the seafarers and the emergency services, who have done this job successfully for generations, about what might occur, will the Minister at least confirm from the Dispatch Box today that if circumstances merit it, he would be willing to reopen this entire recasting and go back to the drawing board?

[Mike Penning]

I respect the right hon. Gentleman’s views, but we took this action because the original proposals were flawed. They were not my proposals; they were the last Government’s proposals.

The point of introducing the resilience that does not currently exist is to end the scaremongering about safety. Safety standards are not good today, but they will be good from now on because of that resilience. In most of the coastguard stations that I visited around the country, including stations in Scotland, I was told, “We know that we have to cut the number of stations to nine or 10.”

[Mrs Louise Ellman (Liverpool, Riverside) (Lab/Co-op)]

I recognise that significant changes have been made since the Government’s original proposals, but what work has been done to ensure that, notwithstanding the scale of the closures, local knowledge will be retained so that lives can be safeguarded?

[Mike Penning]

I fully respect the Chairman of the Select Committee on Transport, whose report helped me to decide how to proceed. The point of keeping one centre in a pair which regularly covers the topography of the other centre’s area is to retain the local knowledge about which so many of those who were consulted expressed concern. I know that there will be disappointment in some parts of the country, but the resilience to which I have referred is more important. We need a 21st-century coastguard.

[Caroline Dinenage (Gosport) (Con)]

My constituents will be very disappointed that the new maritime operations centre will not be based at the Daedalus site. Can the Minister assure us that the hugely experienced coastguards who will lose their jobs at Lee-on-Solent will be helped to find work at the new Fareham site?

[Mike Penning]

I thank my hon. Friend for that important question. When possible we need to retain the experience that we have at the co-ordination centres, particularly the one at the Solent, and we have no intention of making compulsory redundancies there. There will be more job offers at the new MOC, and I hope that as many people as possible transfer to it.

[Angus Robertson (Moray) (SNP)]

I thank the Minister for letting me see his statement in advance, and for the communication in which he has engaged with my hon. Friend the Member for Na h-Eileanan an Iar (Mr MacNeil).

We now know that two out of five Scottish coastguard stations will close, and that we have only an interim contract on the emergency tugs. The Government have announced the scrapping of the entire fleet of fixed-wing long-range search and rescue aircraft, and the future of the air rescue co-ordination centre at Kinloss is still uncertain. Is this not the time to devolve those powers to the Scottish Parliament so that they can be taken seriously?

[Mike Penning]

No.

[Paul Maynard (Blackpool North and Cleveleys) (Con)]

I thank the Minister for his statement, and pay tribute to the great personal effort that I know he has put into visiting every affected coastguard station to ensure that consultation was both open-ended and reasoned. Can he none the less reassure me that when one of a pair of co-ordination centres closes, there will be a structure in place to ensure that local knowledge is transferred between staff and we do not see a sudden cliff-edge changeover?

[Mike Penning]

The closures are planned for March 2015, so there will be no cliff edge. I repeat that, having studied the results of the consultation extremely carefully, we decided to adopt the pair-based system because the current local knowledge of the topography would be retained. When I visited Swansea—and I expect that a Swansea Member will ask a question shortly—the station was closed while I was meeting the staff, and Milford Haven took over the local knowledge. That sort of thing is happening regularly, and it will introduce more resilience to the system.

[Mr Frank Doran (Aberdeen North) (Lab)]

I welcome the Minister’s recognition of the unique position of the Aberdeen station and its links with the oil and gas industry. However, although he has accepted that there needs to be a back-up MOC—which was not included in the plans announced last September—I understand that it is to be a part-time empty station in Dover. The Aberdeen station, which was included in the original December proposals, is fully manned, and could act immediately with a full staff complement in an emergency. What assurances can the Minister give about the security of the system in such circumstances?

[Mike Penning]

The Aberdeen station is not fully manned as a MOC today. It is a co-ordination centre. Under the previous proposals, if we had taken out the second MOC there would have been 23 staff in Scotland, whereas 69 will be working for me at the co-ordination centres in Scotland. We considered carefully whether we would need a second MOC if we kept the twin stations open 24/7, and decided that, with the twin stations open and a nationally resilient communications system, we did not need a full-time second MOC.

[Mr Bernard Jenkin (Harwich and North Essex) (Con)]

May I thank my hon. Friend for this difficult statement and for the sensitive way in which he has approached these very difficult decisions? Can he confirm that he is, in effect, announcing the closure of the coastguard centre at Walton-on-the-Naze today? Will he understand how much of a disappointment that is to local people, and to me and my hon. Friend the Member for Clacton (Mr Carswell), who have made representations to him on this matter? How can we ensure that the local knowledge of the locally employed people there is somehow included in the new arrangements, not least in respect of their job opportunities, even if they wish to continue to live locally?

[Mike Penning]

My hon. Friend knows that I have listened very carefully to the consultation, and to delegations from across the House and across the country. Yes, his local station will close, but the station that covers it on a regular basis will stay open, the local knowledge will still be there and, wherever possible, those staff will be transferred to the new stations.

[Lady Hermon (North Down) (Ind)]

I warmly welcome the confirmation in today’s statement that Northern Ireland’s only coastguard centre will be remaining open in Bangor in my constituency. I am very pleased to put on the record the fact that the Minister listened very carefully to all the political voices raised right across the board in Northern Ireland in support of retaining that coastguard centre. Before he agrees to come back to Bangor at my invitation—we would love to have him back, with the good news—will he kindly confirm that he has sought and obtained reassurances from the Irish Government about the continued availability of Irish helicopters, deployed from Sligo and paid for by the Irish Government, to assist the Northern Ireland coastguard so ably, as they have done in the past?

[Mike Penning]

I thank the hon. Lady for her kind comments. It appears that I was, with my proposals, the only politician in many years to manage to unite all the political parties in Northern Ireland. To be fair, I looked very carefully at where the centre should be; Belfast covered the Clyde, the Clyde covered Belfast and the decision to keep the centre in Belfast was taken for resilience purposes. I have now met two Transport Secretaries from the Republic of Ireland and I understand that they have no plans to remove the excellent service they give us. We will share that service as our new search and rescue helicopter is introduced too.

[Sir Menzies Campbell (North East Fife) (LD)]

Does my hon. Friend understand the degree of disappointment that there will be in my constituency that the opportunity of the second consultation has not been taken to provide a reprieve for the station at Fife Ness? Furthermore, is he aware that fishermen, yachtsmen and all the seafarers who use the firth of Forth believe that his decision is profoundly mistaken?

[Mike Penning]

I apologise to my right hon. and learned Friend if I have not been able to make the announcement that he wanted me to make today, but this consultation was not about Fife—that matter was dealt with in the first consultation and it was finished when the previous Secretary of State made his statements to this House. Although there are concerns, our current system has a national emergency service without any national resilience. That cannot be acceptable and I was not willing to sit, as the Minister, and let that carry on.

[Nia Griffith (Llanelli) (Lab)]

Will the Minister tell us exactly how much money he will be saving by closing Swansea coastguard station, given that there will be a continued presence at that building? How does that compare with the money he would have saved had he chosen to close the centre at Milford Haven instead?

[Mike Penning]

As I said in my statement, there is almost no difference in the cost savings—the cost is in staff. May I say to the hon. Lady that under the proposals that I inherited only one out of the three centres in Wales would have stayed open and there would have been 10 staff in Wales, whereas there are 46 with my announcement today?

[Richard Drax (South Dorset) (Con)]

I know that the Minister will appreciate, because we have sent many submissions to him that Portland coastguard should remain open, how devastated my constituents are that this decision has been made. Will he reassure me and my constituents that if the trial at Fareham does not meet expectations, reopening the Portland centre will be at the top of the agenda?

[Mike Penning]

I thank my hon. Friend for reiterating the importance to his constituents of Portland. However, I am sure that he would join me in saying that the front-line emergency personnel—the volunteers—are the most important people here and their resilience and ability to do their job is the most important thing. We will be able to enhance their training and enhance the pay in our coastguard co-ordination centres. Not in a million years could I have been able to afford to build the facility in Fareham. It was folly of the previous Government to do so and I will utilise that building to its best abilities.

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

I remind the Minister that the two issues that will anger people about the decision on Crosby are those to do with local knowledge of the north-west coast of England and the west of Scotland, which will now be lost, and those to do with the proposal put forward by the staff to host the maritime operations centre at a significant saving. He said in answer to an earlier question that he was not looking at new plans in the second consultation, but would it not have been a good idea for the Government to have done so and to have considered the good ideas coming forward from staff, such as those proposed at Crosby?

[Mike Penning]

On the hon. Gentleman’s second point, the consultation was quite specific about whether we should have one MOC or two MOCs. The second proposal was for a MOC in Aberdeen and I needed to say that we were not going to do that if we were to have the money to keep the other stations open and that we would have the resilience without it. Even though the facilities at Swansea are good, they are nothing compared with the fire control centre I have taken over in Fareham, and I invite any hon. Members to visit that facility. The communications and build quality are second-to-none. As I have said, I could never have afforded to build it so the deal that I have done with the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government is absolutely brilliant. As the hon. Gentleman knows, when I was at Crosby—on my very first visit—the full-time coastguards told me that having the existing 18 centres was wrong and they suggested there should be nine. I am sorry that Crosby is not one of them.

[Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)]

May I congratulate my hon. Friend on producing a well-balanced package under difficult circumstances? In particular, I welcome the promises on reward for our underpaid coastguards. I join him, too, in welcoming the huge contribution made by volunteers, including Whitstable RNLI. When he makes proposals on search and rescue helicopters, will he look closely at the hybrid arrangements in north America, through which the armed forces reserves offer a very cost-effective approach?

[Mike Penning]

Some of what my hon. Friend has just asked for is above my pay grade and even comes under a completely different Department. The Secretary of State is sitting next to me and I am sure that she has heard the message loud and clear.

May I also reiterate—I hope I mentioned it in my statement—my complete admiration for the volunteers, whether they are in the volunteer lifeboats of the RNLI or the 3,500 plus volunteers who go out on a regular basis and put their lives at risk for us?

[Mr Iain McKenzie (Inverclyde) (Lab)]

It will come as no surprise to the Minister that, as the Member for Inverclyde, where the Clyde coastguard is situated, I am deeply disappointed with today’s announcement, which comes on the back of 800 new engagements in the consultation process, tens of thousands of signatures sent to the Prime Minister in support of retaining the Clyde coastguard and numerous letters from organisations to the Minister. How does the Minister intend to assure people on the west coast of Scotland that safety is paramount and that the loss of the Clyde coastguard station will not mean that the area off the coast of the west of Scotland will be a no-shipping zone?

[Mike Penning]

I know that it is difficult, but hon. Members should be careful about the emotive language that they use. When the Clyde co-ordination centre is not operational for whatever reason, its pair does the job on a regular basis. That happens and it happens around the country. That was why we went to this system and that was part of the submission. If the hon. Gentleman is disappointed by what I have said today, I must say to him that the previous Government’s proposals, which were on my desk when I arrived, were 10 times worse.

[Mr Adrian Sanders (Torbay) (LD)]

There will be great disappointment across south Devon at the announcement of the closure of the Brixham control centre. I know that the hon. Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston), if she were able to be in the Chamber today, would share my concern. Can the Minister guarantee that there will continue to be a coastguard presence, if not the control centre, in the Torbay area? Will he consider the possibility of bringing other coastguard activities, such as the training of control centre and rescue staff and even volunteers, into the Torbay area to build on the reputation that the coastguard service has built up over decades?

[Mike Penning]

There is acceptance that the quality of Her Majesty’s coastguard is world-renowned. I was at the International Maritime Organisation’s assembly yesterday morning and the leader of the American coastguard was talking to me about that particular point. The proposals we have finished with today will allow us to have more money for full-time staff to train the volunteers, more equipment and a professional career and pay structure that we would all be happy with, rather than the structure we have today.

[Martin Caton (Gower) (Lab)]

Surely, the most perverse aspect of today’s statement is the proposed closure of Swansea. What justification do the Government give for this? They want to expand the DFT’s economic footprint in west Wales. What is the impact of that? Perhaps the Minister could explain why a so-called employment measure will take jobs away from an area of higher unemployment to protect them in an area of lower unemployment. And how on earth can he justify leaving the Bristol channel, which is one of the most dangerous waters around our country, without a 24-hour coastguard station?

[Mike Penning]

On the first of the two substantive points that the hon. Gentleman raises, the Department and the Secretary of State are responsible for in excess of 5,000 DFT staff in the Swansea area. The economic effect on the small number of staff at Milford Haven is disproportionately beneficial to them compared with what would be the case at Swansea. That is what we have said both in the statement and all the way through. On the second point, when I was at Swansea attending a meeting with the staff, the station was switched off and Milford Haven was covering the very dangerous areas to which the hon. Gentleman refers. If that had not been safe, I am sure the coastguard would not have turned the station off.

[Sarah Newton (Truro and Falmouth) (Con)]

I very much welcome the reassurance that the Minister gave to my hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Sheryll Murray) that the safety of people on our seas will be paramount in all his considerations as the proposals are developed. Will he give me further reassurance that the front-line coastguards at the co-ordination centres that will remain will be given the opportunity to work alongside the coastguards developing the new processes and procedures in the MOCs so that we will truly have the resilient and first-class service that I know he aspires to achieve?

[Mike Penning]

A shocking thing that I found when I took over this job and visited co-ordination centres around the country was the complete lack of co-ordination. The pairs were linked but apart from that there was no national resilience at all. The whole point of doing this is to give us a 21st-century emergency service with that level of communication and skills. Training will be paramount. That will be done not only in the MOCs but across the co-ordination centres because they will be picking up calls from other areas just as the MOCs will be.

[Katy Clark (North Ayrshire and Arran) (Lab)]

Will the Minister clarify the position of the Clyde station given that the lease of the premises is coming to an end at the end of next year? Is that when it will close? This is of great concern given that the maritime operations centre will not be in place then, so there will be no national resilience, and that Belfast is a far smaller station than the Clyde station at the moment. Does he understand the massive concern that we are leading to a situation in which there will be very little cover on the Clyde and far fewer resources than now?

[Mike Penning]

It will not be the case that there will be little cover on the Clyde because that station is paired and the pairing will cover it no matter what. That happens today and has been the case for many years. There is no drawback at all to the front-line emergency services carrying out the rescues. Indeed, the exact opposite is the case—I am enhancing them, I am going to have more paid staff training them and there will be more safety and more cover. I am very aware that the lease on the station is running out, which is why I said in my statement that we will keep a strong footprint in the Clyde area—but it will not be at the existing station.

[Mrs Anne Main (St Albans) (Con)]

I am pleased that the Minister anticipates the operations centre at Fareham coming on line quickly. Will he give some indication of when he anticipates that happening and how long the transitional period might be?

[Mike Penning]

We already have the keys to the operations centre in Fareham and we have been showing staff around. I have not formally signed a contract yet, but I hope to do so in the next few weeks.

[Mark Durkan (Foyle) (SDLP)]

May I associate myself with the comments of the hon. Member for North Down (Lady Hermon) complimenting the Minister on his accessibility during this exercise? Will he assure us that the reduced number of MOCs, with their extended geographic catchments, will give the same quality and level of support as they previously have to our voluntary search and rescue services, which provide such a strong service on our inland waterways?

[Mike Penning]

I am very aware of the unique geographical situation and size of Northern Ireland’s inland waterways. That is one of the reasons why I gave careful consideration to the question of whether it should be Belfast or Liverpool, and why we kept Belfast. The other reason was the unique situation of a border with another EU member state. Also, Belfast has shown time and again its ability to cover for the Clyde so that the pairing system works.

[Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)]

I commend the Minister for the comprehensive and sympathetic way in which he has gone about his further consultation. I acknowledge that one of the paired stations will remain open on a 24/7 basis, but I am concerned that on the east coast it is not the one at Yarmouth, but the one on Humberside. My concern focuses on the broads and the myriad internal waterways. Concern has been expressed to me by the Broads Authority and the Norfolk and Suffolk Boating Association that local knowledge cannot be provided from the Humberside. Will my hon. Friend consider a station operated on a seasonal basis, much the same as for the Thames, to deal with that area?

[Mike Penning]

I fully understand my hon. Friend’s concerns. If I went down that avenue, I would open up a Pandora’s box and my Secretary of State would shoot me. I have holidayed nearly every year for the past 30 years on the Norfolk broads, especially across Breydon water. I understand the concerns, but I think the cover will be resilient enough. I hope people from Yarmouth transfer to the Humber. The new career and pay structures will make it much more worth while than was ever the case in the past, but I understand my hon. Friend’s concerns.

[Mr Speaker]

We are always interested to hear of the Minister’s holiday arrangements, as well as his fear of the death penalty.

[Mr Dave Watts (St Helens North) (Lab)]

The Minister assured the House that there would be some Liverpool-based facility. Will he clarify whether there will be any people in that facility who will be able to rescue anyone?

[Mike Penning]

The rescue facilities in the Liverpool area will be enhanced. We will utilise the buildings that we have so that we do not rent new buildings for the sake of it. We will have more trainers, more enhanced staff, and the volunteers will provide a much better service for the public to rely on.

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

Although my Milton Keynes South constituency is probably as far from any part of the UK coastline as it is possible to be, I take a close interest in these matters as a member of the Transport Committee. I congratulate the Minister on balancing so many competing priorities and representations so objectively and fairly, but can he confirm to me that he is still reversing a key flaw in the original proposals, which was for only daylight operations at some stations?

[Mike Penning]

That is one of the key aspects that we examined to see where resilience would come from. As we looked at the possibility of not having a second full-time MOC, the only way to provide resilience was for all the remaining stations to be open 24/7. That is why they will all be operational 24 hours, not just with daylight manning.

[Andrew Miller (Ellesmere Port and Neston) (Lab)]

Pursuant to the question from my hon. Friend the Member for St Helens North (Mr Watts), and given the diversity of risks in Liverpool bay, ranging from the myriad estuaries to complex offshore facilities, is the Minister satisfied that the co-ordination facilities in the Liverpool bay area will be adequate? I share his view about national resilience. Will he look very carefully to make sure that what he is delivering meets what he says?

[Mike Penning]

As an ex-firefighter, I would never in a million years propose something that I did not feel would have the resilience, the technology, the skills and the local topography to allow it to take place. The volunteers in the Liverpool area, particular in the area that I visited, have unbelievable skills, which will be enhanced, not hindered.

[Brandon Lewis (Great Yarmouth) (Con)]

Although there will be huge disappointment in Great Yarmouth at the loss of our coastguard station, we note the Minister’s earlier comments about the job opportunities, the local knowledge and the resilience that could be improved with the Humber pair being kept. We are grateful for his recent visit to Great Yarmouth to visit the Caister independent lifeboat. Will he confirm that the Maritime and Coastguard Agency will continue to work as closely with independent lifeboats such as those at Caister and Hemsby as it does with the excellent Royal National Lifeboat Institution?

[Mike Penning]

One of the great things about having the RNLI is that it is a brand known worldwide and a fantastic facility. However, little is known in this country about the volunteer lifeboats. There are huge numbers, including the one that I visited and went out to sea on at Caister recently, where the crew desperately tried to make me seasick, unsuccessfully. I can assure the House that not only will the facility be as good as it is now, but it will be better.

[Mr Russell Brown (Dumfries and Galloway) (Lab)]

I am sure that the Minister will recognise the bitter disappointment of those in my locality who campaigned so hard to retain both the Liverpool and Clyde facilities, which serve 200 miles of coastline. The Scottish Government Transport Minister failed to recognise the significance of Liverpool to the Solway coast, but did the Secretary of State for Scotland and the Under-Secretary of State make any representations to him about retaining the Clyde facility?

[Mike Penning]

The Scotland Office was fully informed of the proposal. I phoned the Minister yesterday to tell him, and I did the same for the Wales Office. This is a national emergency service, so the House and the Government are fully responsible for it. I understand the concerns, but we must reiterate that at the moment we do not have a national resilience service. If two of these pairs go down, there is no way that we can provide the cover necessary in a 21st-century service. This should have been done years ago, as I know the hon. Gentleman will admit.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

Each year, the coastal waters have more and more incidents. Will my hon. Friend assure me that the surveillance and subsequent safety of our coastal waters will be maintained under the new proposals?

[Mike Penning]

I am sure that my hon. Friend is aware that these days in a co-ordination centre binoculars are not the usual piece of equipment used to survey what is going on at sea. The electronic equipment that we use is highly technical and works very well. In times of high need, we will be able to move that around the network so that other less important jobs that are already flowing through can be taken on by other stations or the MOC while new emergencies that are coming on board, with the local knowledge that is so desperately needed, can be facilitated.

[Albert Owen (Ynys Môn) (Lab)]

May I join the Minister and the shadow Minister in paying tribute to the search and rescue family, including volunteers of coastguard services, for the excellent work that they do in protecting our coastline and coastal waters? May I also thank the Minister for reiterating the strategic importance of Holyhead and invite him to visit it, because he did not have a chance to do so during the consultation period? Will he assure the House that there will be constructive dialogue between management and the work force, including the unions, on this modernisation programme, so that they are fully involved and their ideas and local skills are used to make up this resilience that he talks about? Will he also assure the House that people will be told of redundancy and of any displacement that there will throughout the United Kingdom in plenty of time?

[Mike Penning]

I have been working with the Public and Commercial Services union since day one when I became the Minister. I met its representatives very early on. They have been desperate for this issue to be resolved once and for all. They know the service needs to be modernised and that there had to be closures. They knew that all the way through, and I have discussed that with them fully. They were part of the group that looked at the proposals and the consultation documents that came in. We will work closely with the unions and the non-unionised members of staff, so that we ensure that whatever happens they know. I do not think that there will be any redundancies in Holyhead, but, overall, we will do our level best to make sure that it is natural wastage and that we keep the skills within the service.

[Dr Julian Huppert (Cambridge) (LD)]

I welcome the use of the vacant fire control centre at Fareham. It gives us a chance to recoup some of the half a billion spent on the fire control centres scrapped last year and described by the Public Accounts Committee as flawed from the outset. Will the Minister assure me that the coastguard modernisation process will not suffer the same problems that led to the disaster with the fire control centres? In particular, how will the link between the maritime operations centre and the coastguard stations work in practice?

[Mike Penning]

Rather than just using the radio, the new centre has unbelievable communication. The state-of-the-art technology has been put into that building at huge cost to the taxpayer, and it is a real shame that I cannot use all the buildings around the country and can only use the one.

[Geraint Davies (Swansea West) (Lab/Co-op)]

The Minister in his statement when considering the pros and cons of Milford Haven and Swansea said that “there are no operational reasons for choosing one of these sites rather than the other”, and that the building in Swansea will remain operational. He said that Swansea was switched off in a planned way to enable Milford Haven to take over, but will he accept that on a number of occasions Milford Haven has closed down in an unplanned way, that Swansea is the second busiest coastguard, that the protest involved hundreds of thousands of people compared with a much smaller protest from Milford Haven, and that people locally will rightly see this as a cynical political, rather than operational, move that will affect the risk to Cardiff, Newport, Swansea and Devon?

[Mike Penning]

I understand the hon. Gentleman’s disappointment. I went to Swansea and, after the driver drove through the picket, went back to speak with everyone on the picket line as well as all the staff. I fully admit that there was a planned shutdown during my visit, just as there was a planned shutdown while the refurbishment took place at Swansea, when Milford covered it for weeks and weeks. I am sorry that he was not fully informed about the number of closures that took place in the past. He is absolutely right that sometimes stations go down without warning, which is why we need a national resilience system, which we do not have today. That is the most important thing.

[Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes) (Con)]

The Minister specifically mentioned the importance of the links between the gas and oil sectors in Aberdeen. He will be aware that that is equally important in the Humber, an area where there is likely to be a rapid expansion in the energy sector in coming years. Will he assure me that he is fully satisfied that the expansion will be fully catered for and that it will be kept under regular review?

[Mike Penning]

My hon. Friend raises an important point. I think that he would accept that there is a structural difference between the oil and gas sector and offshore wind. We are working much more closely with the Department of Energy and Climate Change and the Crown Estate, which owns the seabed, than ever before. Under the previous Administration decisions were made and the Department for Transport was then told much later. We will work together closely and address any risks as needed.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I thank the Minister for his statement and associate myself with the kind comments of the hon. Members for North Down (Lady Hermon) and for Foyle (Mark Durkan). The Minister came over to Northern Ireland, listened and clearly delivered, and we are thankful that the Northern Ireland coastguard will be part of the strategy for the whole of the United Kingdom. He indicated that the Northern Ireland coastguard will be responsible not only for Northern Ireland, but for the Clyde. What staff and resources will be made available to the Northern Ireland coastguard to deliver a full and better service?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mike Penning]

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman will be aware that the Bangor co-ordination centre already covers the Clyde on a regular basis. We will ensure that it is fully staffed, that staff have the right pay and conditions, which we will negotiate with the trade unions and those who are not in the trade unions and—I reiterate—that we have the sort of resilience that the service deserves.

Coastguard Modernisation

Mike Penning Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd November 2011 Written Statements

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

I will be making an oral statement later today.

Transport

Mike Penning Excerpts

Monday 14th November 2011 Ministerial Corrections

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

I hope those people will drive not only at an appropriate pace but at a safe pace within the law. As my hon. Friend knows, we started the project early and promised that we would be as fast as we possible could. We hope that it will be done in early 2014, but if it can be done earlier, we certainly will do it.

[Official Report, 10 November 2011, Vol. 535, c. 434.]

Letter of correction from Mike Penning:

An error has been identified in the oral answer given on 10 November 2011. The correct answer should have been:

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

I hope those people will drive not only at an appropriate pace but at a safe pace within the law. As my hon. Friend knows, we started the project early and promised that we would be as fast as we possible could. It is programmed to finish by early 2015, towards the end of the 2014-15 financial year, but if it can be done earlier, we certainly will do it.

Oral Answers to Questions

Mike Penning Excerpts

Thursday 10th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr John Baron (Basildon and Billericay) (Con)]

4. If she will make it her policy not to increase Dartford crossing charges and to introduce automatic number plate recognition technology to reduce congestion at the crossing.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

At the time of the 2010 spending review, the Department for Transport set out its policy for increasing charges at the Dartford crossing, as part of a package of improvements for short, medium and long-term improvements. That included the introduction of free-flow tolling. My answer is that the Government do not intend to change their policy.

[Mr Baron]

May I, therefore, suggest that the Department has got it wrong? Given that the existing crossing makes around £30 million to £40 million profit a year, surely it would be better to introduce automatic number plate recognition technology at the existing crossing first to see whether that solves the congestion problem before raising tariffs to fund a second crossing? With the new Secretary of State in place, could we please have some fresh thinking on this?

[Mike Penning]

I know my hon. Friend’s views on the matter very well and that he lobbies very hard on that particular point. However, even with free-flow tolling at Dartford, the northern approach to the tunnels will still be congested, even according to the predictions we have now. The small bore tunnel has a huge restriction. We need to look at having another Thames crossing for this piece of national—I repeat, national—infrastructure.

[Michael Fallon (Sevenoaks) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend accept that there is a persistently serious problem of peak-hour congestion, both northbound and southbound, which is costing everybody an awful lot of time and money? Why cannot we have earlier and clearer signage and much better traffic management at the point of the toll booths themselves?

[Mike Penning]

We are aware of the congestion at the toll, but most of that is caused by the barriers. An archaic method of collecting tolls is in place. We will introduce free-flow tolling as soon as we can. A lot of construction work needs to be done but, at the end of the day, the biggest problem is that the M25 is such a success we need to have another crossing over the Thames.

[Paul Maynard (Blackpool North and Cleveleys) (Con)]

5. What plans she has for future funding for railway stations.

--- Later in debate ---

[Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)]

10. What steps her Department is taking to monitor use of the road network by foreign HGV drivers.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

The Vehicle and Operator Services Agency, for which I am responsible, carried out 67,000 checks last year on foreign-registered heavy goods vehicles for compliance with roadworthiness, overloading and drivers’ hours rules. The Department regularly publishes statistics on the amount of goods transported to and from the United Kingdom by foreign-registered HGVs.

[Fiona Bruce]

I was recently advised by a constituent of an accident that she had on the busy stretch of the M6 between Sandbach and Knutsford, in which she was hit by a foreign lorry driver in a left-hand drive vehicle who did not see her in his mirrors as he moved into the middle lane. In virtually the same place, a family of six were tragically killed in an accident caused by a foreign lorry driver in 2008. What steps can the Government take to prevent such accidents from occurring again?

[Mike Penning]

I am aware of the problems that occur around the country, particularly as a former HGV driver myself, including the problems that foreign drivers have with their mirrors. That is something that we are considering with our European counterparts. However, we must realise that only 3.5% of the HGVs on British roads and 5.2% of those on our motorways are foreign. Although it is a big issue, the biggest issue is with HGV driving and the quality of driving as a whole, not just with overseas drivers.

[Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)]

There would be the possibility of taking up to 5 million lorry journeys off our roads every year, provided that there was the rail capacity to take those journeys. There is a scheme to promote a dedicated freight railway line from the channel tunnel to Glasgow, linking all the main conurbations throughout Britain. Under that scheme, full-scale lorries, double stack containers and so on would go on trains. I am happy to explain the scheme to the Minister if he would be interested.

[Mike Penning]

My door is always open to the hon. Gentleman, as he knows. The biggest issue with rail freight is capacity. The west coast main line in particular, which runs through his part of the world and my part of the world, is at capacity levels. That is why High Speed 2 is so important.

[Mr Speaker]

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman feels an Adjournment debate coming on. We shall no doubt discover whether that is the case.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sheila Gilmore (Edinburgh East) (Lab)]

13. What assessment she has made of the effect on road safety of the decision to permit longer heavy goods vehicles.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

The Government’s response to the consultation on the use of longer semi-trailers includes a revised impact assessment. It indicates that the forthcoming trial of 1,800 trailers should result in a marginal reduction in accidents and fatalities and their associated costs.

[Sheila Gilmore]

Given that the original consultation document admitted that longer lorries are less safe, and in the light of the tragic circumstances of last week, which were admittedly different, do the Government not now have cause to reconsider taking any risk with safety by introducing such lorries?

[Mike Penning]

What happened on the M5 was a tragic incident, and our thoughts and sympathies are with the families who have lost their loved ones and the people who are still very seriously ill in hospital. No assumptions should be made until after the police inquiry is completed.

The research was undertaken by the Transport Research Laboratory, a world-leading independent body. It indicates that there will be a 1.6% reduction in road casualties.

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

14. If she will establish a public inquiry into the Grayrigg train crash in February 2007.

--- Later in debate ---

[Matthew Hancock (West Suffolk) (Con)]

T6. In Mildenhall, Brandon, Elveden and across Suffolk and East Anglia, people are thrilled that the Government are finally completing the dualling of the A11, but the questions they are now asking are when will it be finished, and when can they finally drive at an appropriate pace all the way up to Norfolk?[Official Report, 14 November 2011, Vol. 535, c. 3MC.]

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

I hope those people will drive not only at an appropriate pace but at a safe pace within the law. As my hon. Friend knows, we started the project early and promised that we would be as fast as we possibly could. We hope that it will be done in early 2014, but if it can be done earlier, we certainly will do it.

[Alun Michael (Cardiff South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op)]

T5. Given the threat of ever higher train prices and the success of mutual solutions—for example, Glas Cymru—in reducing the burden on consumers, will the Secretary of State accept the Co-operative party’s People Rail proposals and put passengers in the driving seat?

Cost of Motor Insurance

Mike Penning Excerpts

Tuesday 8th November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Jim Dowd (Lewisham West and Penge) (Lab)]

May I apologise to you, Mr Deputy Speaker, and to my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman) for missing the first few moments of her introduction to the debate? I commend her and the Committee for the excellent work they have done in this timely report. As she mentioned, the motor car has moved a long way from being a luxury to being, although not quite a necessity, something that is critical to the economic and social well-being of many millions of people across the country. Issues relating to cars clearly have a wide impact in every constituency.

The issue of young drivers concerns everybody. The difficulty that many of them have in obtaining insurance is only one part of that. I remember when I bought my first car back in—

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

A Model T?

[Jim Dowd]

No, it was not a Model T—it was a Mini, back in 1968. It was six years old and it cost me just over £100. By the time I had got my insurance, which was £60, plus four-months’ road tax—as it was then and as the rest of the world calls it, or vehicle excise duty as we call it now—and an MOT certificate, I had spent as much on those three items as the car had cost me. I was quite young at the time and that was probably reflected in the premium, but none the less it was a shock to have to spend as much on ancillary costs as on the vehicle itself.

Today, we hear stories of young people having a vehicle costing a few hundred pounds and insurance premiums of more than £1,000. It is not the cost of the vehicle that is the issue; it is the risk of using it on the road. Effectively, motor insurance is a public liability insurance; one does not necessarily have to insure one’s property but one does have to insure against damage to other people’s property and, indeed, to other people. It is the scale of the problem that we need to look at. As has been said, there are more than 30 million cars on the road and it does not take a genius to work out that as the number of cars on the road rises, so the likelihood of accidents rises in similar proportion. However, I believe that this country has a very good, but still improvable, record on reducing road accidents and certainly road casualties.

One shock that I had in 1992 when I was first elected to the House—apart from having been elected to the House—was the fact that for the first time in more than 20 years I had to buy my own car. I had experienced the comparative luxury of having a company car in the intervening 20 years and precisely because I did not have a personal insurance record—a no-claims bonus, as everyone knows it—at that time, the first insurance quote I got was more than £1,200 for a very medium-range car, which my former company kindly sold to me. It was only when I got the company to provide me with a certificate saying that I had had blemish-free motoring for 10 years or more that the insurance company reduced the figure, but it still only came down to £800—and that was the better part of 20 years ago. The problems with increased costs in insurance and the increased likelihood of people driving uninsured, as well as the risks posed to those people and, more particularly, to everybody else, are intolerable.

Motor insurance is a curious entity in that it is one of the few examples, although not the only example, of a statutory obligation to purchase a product from a private supplier. There may be far more than one supplier, but one has to have motor insurance to drive on public roads. That places on the motor insurance industry particular responsibilities that it should meet but that would not otherwise arise. I think the situation implies that the industry should have the most stringent, open, transparent—I think a Government Member said that transparency was a key issue—and fair standards of behaviour towards customers because it has a captive market. I accept that people can move from one provider to another, but one thing they have to have to drive on public roads is motor insurance. If one’s household contents insurance premium becomes unsustainable or extortionate, one can either go to another supplier or take the risk on oneself. One can say, “The premiums are not worth what I’m paying: I’ll take the risk on myself. I don’t have to have it,” but the same is not true of motor insurance. If one wants to drive on a public road one has to be insured.

The industry is confronted by a number of problems, to which others have referred. For example, there is the rise in personal injury claims, almost all of which seem to include claims for whiplash injury, as well as the issue of referral fees, which the report has looked at and which others have mentioned. There is also the growth of the no win, no fee—or ambulance chasing, as it is known in some circles—industry, and the business of downright fraudulent claims. All these issues have to be grappled with by the industry, which is an extensive one, and I am sure that people will have different views about how well it is dealing with them.

The report covered a number of areas, including personal injury claims, referral fees, uninsured drivers and fraud, but it did not cover an area that I want to make particular reference to on behalf of one of my constituents. He is 73 years old, and he has been working as a minicab driver for a number of years. He has a state pension, although not a full one, and that is his only other income, so he is keen to carry on working. In August this year, his then insurer advised him not that it was putting up his premium but that it was cancelling his hire and reward cover. It gave no other reason than the fact that he was now 73, as though he had just gone across some magical threshold. It was not even prepared to take on the risk at a higher price.

My constituent quite understands that, as people grow older, so they might become a bigger risk and therefore have to pay a bigger premium, but the insurer would not increase the premium. It simply would not accept the risk, for no other reason than his age. His wife is somewhat younger than him, but she, too, is past retirement age. She is still working, however, so his recourse to benefits would be somewhat limited. He contacted other insurance companies and brokers, but to no avail. He got no offers at all to renew his hire and reward cover, which is essential for anyone wishing to work as a minicab driver.

My constituent’s social, domestic and pleasure policy was unaffected, except for a marginal increase in price. I could understand if the insurer felt that he was a danger to the public and should therefore not be on the road. I would not agree with such a proposition—I do not think that any sensible person would—but it would at least have the characteristic of consistency. As things stand, however, it is perfectly legal for him to drive on the roads as a private citizen in his very unglamorous minicab, but it is no longer possible for him to pursue his livelihood as a minicab driver.

The majority of the population have a driving licence, and I quite understand why they expire on the licence holder’s 70th birthday. The assumption is that we need to consider whether people are still fit to drive on public roads. The primary consideration must be safety, not least the safety of other road users, and it is perfectly reasonable to check people’s eyesight and reaction times more as they get older, to ensure that they can still drive safely. We are told that we have an increasingly ageing population, so this is going to become more and more of an issue. There is no question but that everyone who drives on public roads should be deemed fit to do so, but I cannot understand the distinction between my constituent driving as a private individual and driving for gain as a minicab driver.

After my constituent had been to see me, I wrote to the Chancellor of the Exchequer and to the director-general of the Association of British Insurers. I got a reply from the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, in which he states:

“Some age-based practices, such as the use of broad age bands combined with significant price increases between age bands, may appear arbitrary. Insurers, however, use age bands as a means by which to price the risk of insuring a variety of individuals, and the transaction costs involved. The effects of age bands will, however, be reflected in the premium charged to an individual should they enter a new band.”

As I have said, my constituent has been denied that opportunity, as he has not been put into a new band. His premium has not been increased; it has been refused.

I also received a response from Mr Otto Thoresen, the director-general of the Association of British Insurers. I will read out a point that supports exactly what the Committee says in its report. He says:

“In 2010, motor insurers paid out £1.21 in claims and expenses for every £1 received in premiums. A combination of high legal costs, rapidly increasing personal injury claims, fraud, and a stubbornly high level of uninsured driving have driven the industry to a point where, after price stability and, in many cases, falling premiums in the middle of the last decade, they have now had to rise.”

The Committee makes that point as well. Mr Thoresen went on to say that there were issues relating to the taxi insurance business, and that

“evidence across the market has shown that the probability of being involved in an accident worsens as drivers reach their mid-70s”,

as my constituent is now doing.

One of the objections to the way in which insurance companies conduct their business is that, when it suits them to do so, they treat people as individuals, and if an individual has a particularly poor record, they will suffer the consequences. However, when it suits them, they also treat people as part of a group that has an alleged poor record, and increase the premiums accordingly. This never seems to work in the opposite direction.

Mr Thoresen suggested that my constituent continue to try to secure insurance through a specialist broker, and he very kindly gave me the details of four specialist companies for him to approach. My constituent contacted me again in the middle of October, having contacted all four companies. Of the four, three would not offer him insurance at all, and the one company that did so wanted about £750 a month. That amounts to well over £9,000 a year. I have absolute confidence that my constituent is an excellent minicab driver, and I am sure that his customers must be among the happiest in south London, but I am also fairly certain that he does not make enough money to pay £9,000 a year in insurance costs.

In the Financial Secretary’s response, he also said:

“Research has indicated that no age groups are specifically excluded from the insurance market”.

I suggest to him that it is unnecessary specifically to exclude anyone if they are being offered a price that is completely and utterly unaffordable. Theoretically, everyone in this country can go and stay at the Savoy—there is not a sign outside saying “No riff-raff”—but most people would not consider doing so because they cannot afford it. Similarly, in this case, that insurer made the cover so unaffordable that it might just as well have banned my constituent from having it. He and I have no objection to the need for an increase, but we object to the scale and disproportionate nature of that increase. All he wants to do is continue to pursue his livelihood and not have to depend on benefits.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Shannon]

I am not aware of all the details. I am aware only that compensation claims are down. The value is down, as well as the numbers. That indicates that we deserve consideration when it comes to premiums. That is the point I am making.

A number of the factors that are thought to have contributed to the rise in the cost of insurance premiums in England and Wales are absent from Northern Ireland—again, it is important to draw the comparison. The absence of no win, no fee agreements means that those in Northern Ireland who are seeking compensation must invest their own funds—perhaps that explains the previous point—before a legal claim can be brought. Alternatively, a solicitor’s practice may be willing to fund the outlays. This dissuades unmeritorious litigants. Furthermore, in England and Wales a successful plaintiff’s solicitor can claim a success fee, which can increase legal costs by up to 100%. There is no provision for success fees in Northern Ireland.

The insurance market in Northern Ireland shares a number of characteristics with England and Wales. The same advertisements are shown on TV. Admiral Group advertises on TV, as does Churchill, but underneath, the wee small print says, “Not available in Northern Ireland.” So although Churchill says, “Oh, yes” to every question he is asked, that does not apply to Northern Ireland, so there is clearly an issue to be addressed. The insurance market in Northern Ireland shares a number of characteristics, but not the price. That is the point we want to make.

Some time ago I had the opportunity to go with some of my constituents to meet the Department of the Environment in relation to a suggestion we were making. Perhaps the Minister in his response, as well as the Committee, will take this on board to see how we could reduce premiums and fees in Northern Ireland. One of the suggestions that was made concerned a new scheme that exists in parts of America and Europe, whereby a gadget, for want of a better word, is put in cars that monitors the speed and the mannerisms of the driver. That feeds back to a central place. That reduces fees because if drivers transgress, on the principle of “Three strikes and you’re out,” they lose their premium reduction. That might be a way of addressing some of the issues.

[Mike Penning]

It is not for me to publicise which companies do that, but, as we heard from the hon. Member for Brecon and Radnorshire (Roger Williams), at least one of them does, and there are several available on the market.

[Jim Shannon]

It is not for me to advertise those firms either, but I understand that they do good work and there are good possibilities for young drivers.

We want to make it clear, first, that the number of insurance providers operating in the market is lower than in England and Wales, restricting choice for consumers and reducing competition within the market. Secondly, there is a small number of accident management companies operating in Northern Ireland. There is some suggestion that costs are higher when accident management companies are involved. Despite the point that was made earlier, that may be a contributing factor and requires consideration. Lastly, the fact that Northern Ireland is a rural community with a dense road network and high levels of social need requires specific consideration.

Northern Ireland Members of Parliament have a duty tonight to highlight the imbalance in insurance premiums between Northern Ireland and the rest of the United Kingdom. We believe that, as the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside said in her submission, a review is needed. Northern Ireland needs to be part of that cross-departmental ministerial committee. We look forward to its conclusion and to a reduction in fees for car drivers and for those who have to pay such high insurance premiums in Northern Ireland. I support the proposal.

--- Later in debate ---

[John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Lab/Co-op)]

May I add my congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman) on securing this important and well informed debate, and to the Committee on producing its excellent and timely report?

The eye-watering rises in the cost of motor insurance in the past few years have been one more burden on families already hit by high prices at the pump, food inflation and soaring energy costs. Earlier in the year, annual increases in insurance premiums were running as high as 40%. Although the AA reports that by September the figure had dropped to around 16%, premium increases still far outstrip inflation. The average premium of £921, which my hon. Friend highlighted, means that more than half an average monthly take-home salary is used simply to insure a car.

We know that those likely to be earning least are paying most for their insurance. As we have heard, average premiums for young drivers are more than £2,000. Understandably, motorists resent those huge increases. The overwhelming majority of careful, responsible drivers feel that they are subsidising the careless, the reckless and the uninsured. Increasingly, they are aware that their premiums are increasing as a result of fraudulent or frivolous personal injury claims for non-existent or pre-existing conditions.

Although the Government should not get into the business of setting insurance premiums, Ministers have a responsibility to ensure that the market works fairly and in the interests of consumers. The insurance industry has made a strong case that the 75% increase in the number of compensation claims in the past five years is a key factor in driving up premiums. Increased access to legal redress for genuine injury is a good thing, but responsible motorists paying for insurance fraud is clearly not.

For many, the car is and will remain the essential way of getting around. For some—and, as we have heard, particularly young people—the fast-rising cost of insurance could make the difference between taking up a job that requires a car and being a burden on taxpayers by living on benefits. With job vacancies so scarce, transport to access opportunity needs to be affordable—that relates to motor insurance just as it relates to bus and rail fares.

The sky-high cost of motor insurance for young people has been an important part of the Opposition’s policy review. We urge the Government to implement the Committee’s recommendations to improve the education and safety awareness of young drivers and to consider further changes to the driving test.

It is important to stress that all drivers will benefit from having safer younger drivers on the road—that point was well made in the debate. Equally importantly, much has been heard about the potential of the black box and the relative lack of take-up so far. I am sure that the Minister will join me in praising insurance providers that use black boxes, but will he make clear what he is doing to encourage greater take-up of the technology among providers?

There is no excuse for breaking the rules, but as premiums rise we know that related criminal behaviour is at risk of increasing, potentially undermining the progress that the previous Administration made in tackling fraud and driving without insurance. The Association of British Insurers recorded a 9% increase in fraud.

[Mike Penning]

Would the hon. Gentleman be kind enough to tell the House what measures the previous Administration took against uninsured driving? This Government introduced the continuous insurance policy.

[John Woodcock]

The hon. Gentleman knows that the continuous insurance policy was a measure that was set out by the Labour party and which he has taken forward, which we welcome. According to the Motor Insurers Bureau, however, there has been a 25% fall in insurance fraud and uninsured driving over the past five years, which we welcome and want to see continue.

On tackling uninsured drivers, the Minister mentioned the continuous insurance enforcement scheme, but to work effectively that needs the necessary tools to do the enforcing, so will he tell the House, either now or during his speech, what level of resource the DVLA has put aside to pursue and enable the prosecution of transgressors, and how many drivers who ignore official reminders that their insurance has expired have so far been given a fixed penalty notice under the new scheme?

Last week, the House had the opportunity to debate referral fees paid by claims management companies and personal injury lawyers to insurance firms in return for the details of potential claimants. For the past five or six years, these fees have greased the wheels of a perceived compensation culture, encouraging claims that have little realistic chance of success or which are simply fraudulent. The cost of those claims feed directly back into the premiums that all motorists pay, so I, too, pay tribute to the work done by my right hon. Friend the Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw) on this issue. His investigation into the scale of the problem and his private Member’s Bill put pressure on Ministers to add clauses on referral fees, at the last moment, to the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill last week. However, as we made clear then, the Government have so far missed the opportunity to crack down adequately.

I shall list what measures the Government have so far rejected: making the soliciting for and payment of fees in road traffic accident cases a criminal offence; outlawing the blight of unsolicited phone calls and text messages; strengthening the rules on data protection and third-party capture; and tightening the rules for whiplash claims. It is unfortunate that as industry practice has been shown to be driving up costs for law-abiding motorist, the Government are ducking their responsibilities on this issue. If the Minister is serious about keeping premiums as low as possible, I hope that, even at this late stage, he will prevail upon Justice Ministers to change the Government’s position.

The Select Committee made the sensible suggestion that the Government examine international experience on restraining claims numbers. It is disappointing that Ministers have refused its idea of a proper study. I hope that they will reconsider. The Committee also rightly pointed to the importance of road safety as another key factor influencing insurance premiums. Despite last week’s horrific tragedy—the Minister visited the scene, at the M5 in Somerset, at the weekend—Britain continues to have the safest roads in Europe and among the safest in the world. However, the first two quarters of this year have seen increases in deaths compared with the same point the previous year. A continuation of that trend would mean 2011 would be the first year since 2003 to see a rising death toll on Britain’s roads.

It is worrying that these upward ticks in road deaths have come at a time when spending on road safety campaigns has been cut. If the trend of safer roads were to reverse, the country’s principal concern—everyone’s principal concern—would, of course, be the tragic human cost seen so vividly this week. We know that a knock-on effect of less safe roads would be further upward pressure on insurance premiums. That raises this question: has the Minister estimated what the impact would be on road safety and on premiums of his proposal to scrap the annual MOT—a move that could lead to 800,000 cars that are dangerous to drive being left on the roads for up to a year longer?

Motorists are feeling the squeeze. Many face being priced out of their cars and, by extension, out of their jobs. As the Transport Committee has so effectively set out, those motorists want to know that their Government are doing what they can to enable lower insurance costs. If Ministers wish to prove that they are not out of touch with those concerns, they need to set out how they will go further.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

For colleagues who have been here throughout the debate, may I say—I know it is not my brief to do so—that my thoughts and prayers go to the family of the Red Arrows pilot who was killed this afternoon? Our servicemen do a lot for us. I say this as colleagues might not know that, sadly, this pilot died—the second fatality in the Red Arrows this year.

This afternoon’s debate has been excellent—led brilliantly by the Chair of the Transport Select Committee, the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman). In general, the debate has been sensible, measured and useful to our constituents. I cannot say that about parts of the speech by the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock), particularly when it became party political. That is not what this evening’s debate was about, especially considering that the previous Administration were in government for 13 years and many of the measures he now asks us to bring forward could have been introduced then. The hon. Member for Poplar and Limehouse (Jim Fitzpatrick), a former Front-Bench Transport spokesman was much better in his tone; he never used to read out a speech that was written before and that did not contribute anything to the debate.

To answer what was probably the only sensible point that the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness raised—about continuous insurance enforcement—60% of all those written to, having been shown to be uninsured, have responded positively and were either given a statutory off-road notice or said that they would insure. About £122,000 has been picked up in fines, and 250,000 penalty notices have been issued—in excess of what we expected at this stage of the new piece of legislation.

Let us move on to the general debate, led so excellently by the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside. Everyone will be pleased to know that we shall not divide the House on the motion. There is an issue about the committee that is being formed, but I will come back to that in a few moments. Many of the issues I see in my constituency correspondence have been alluded to brilliantly in this evening’s debate.

To add to the anecdotal evidence, a member of my own staff was in a road traffic accident the other evening. She was hit from behind; the person got out of the car and was very amenable. My staff member said, “How are you? Are you okay? Do you want to go through the insurance process?” The other lady said, “I’d like to pay you privately because otherwise my premiums will go through the roof.” Everything was sorted out fine; no contact was made with the insurers or the police. However, she received a text message asking “Would you like to claim for the injury that you had?” A member of the public had obviously informed those whom I described to the Committee as ambulance chasers. Apparently it is not just the insurers who are passing information around; others also think that they can secure substantial earnings from such events.

Several Members paid tribute to the right hon. Member for Blackburn (Mr Straw). I thank him, in his absence, for contacting me to say that he could not be present this evening. We have worked closely for many years on many subjects when our respective parties have been in opposition and in government, and I believe that the motion has opened the Government’s eyes to the possibility of using his Bill for this purpose. There will of course be attempts to find loopholes, but it is the Government’s responsibility to ensure that any legislation is fit for purpose.

I believe that 11, if not 12, Members spoke in the debate—that does not include those who have intervened—and it will be impossible for me to respond to all the points that they raised, but I will of course write to all those whose questions I have not had time to answer.

My hon. Friend the Member for Lincoln (Karl MᶜCartney) made an important point about uninsured drivers. Uninsured driving is a criminal offence, and I am sure that no Member would condone it, but given that it contributes only £30 to the average premium, there must be many other factors in the market. I see that the hon. Member for South Down (Ms Ritchie) is present, and I shall comment on the position in Northern Ireland shortly, but the fact remains that that £30 is not the reason that premiums have been shooting through the roof—although we have seen some reduction in recent months.

Nevertheless, notwithstanding our concern about the size of premiums, we must in no circumstances condone uninsured driving, which plagues not only our constituents who pay their premiums but the police. Like the hon. Member for Bradford East (Mr Ward), I have been out with the local police force many times, and I am sure that anyone else who has done so will confirm that when the police pull drivers over for being uninsured, they will almost certainly pick them up for another offence which, in many cases, will have nothing to do with driving offences. People who wish to break the law in that way often wish to break it in other ways. We must help the police in every possible way to ensure that such fraud is dealt with, because driving without insurance is indeed fraudulent.

We must also help the insurers, who will doubtless be monitoring this debate and will realise that they are the pariahs: the nasty, horrible people to whom we must pay our premiums. I suppose that I should declare an interest at this stage. I have two daughters between the ages of 17 and 25, and the premium is high. I am proud to say that they have managed to work hard throughout their time at university, and that the work that they have done has helped to pay the insurance. I have not had to bear the whole burden.

The hon. Member for Bolton West (Julie Hilling) mentioned the crass decision by the European Court of Justice that gender could not be taken into account by insurers deciding premiums, although, as we all know, premiums are based on risk. I find that astonishing, because the figures clearly show that, sadly, boys aged between 17 and 25 are 10 times more likely to be involved in accidents than girls of a similar age. One of the most frightening pieces of evidence that has been given to me while I have had the honour of being the Minister responsible for these matters is that the most dangerous activity in which a young lady can engage in this country is sitting next to a boy aged between 17 and 25 who is driving a car.

[Jim Dowd]

Is not the problem with the European approach the assumption that every member of a certain group will behave in a certain way? It is a generalised rather than a personalised approach. The assessment is being made not on the basis of what a particular individual who wants to buy a particular product is likely to do, but on the basis of what people in a particular category are likely to do. Even if there is no evidence against an individual, that individual will be subject to the same penalty.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mike Penning]

I completely agree—just as I often agreed with the hon. Gentleman during the many years when we served on the Health Committee together. The actuaries have to be able to look at risk in general; otherwise we will all be put into the same pot, which is unfair to those who are in lower-risk categories. I have concerns that addressing this issue will lead to premiums being increased, not reduced.

Many colleagues, including the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), have said we need to do more about the insurers, and I agree. I certainly do bring the insurers around the table, and I give them a very hard time. After all, they want things from me. They wanted the continuous insurance; they have been calling for that for years, and they have got it. They also want access to DVLA data in order to try to alleviate fraud, both intentional and unintentional.

People ask me, “What do you mean by ‘unintentional fraud’?” Well, I am a dad, and I was asked whether I would put my daughter on the insurance as an additional driver. I had to look very carefully at whether she was an additional driver or the main driver, but most parents would not know the difference, so we need to educate them on that. They think they are helping their young people by naming them as an additional driver in those circumstances, but if their son or daughter is, in fact, not the additional driver, that insurance will be invalid, and the insurer will almost certainly find that out—and if the son or daughter is involved in a crash, they will almost certainly not be covered, and anybody else involved in the accident with them will also be penalised.

Some Members who were present for the debate have moved on to other things, so our proceedings now feel a little like an Adjournment debate, where people have not returned for the concluding speeches. That is a shame, because this is not an Adjournment debate; it is, rather, a proper debate of the House with a motion before it. Perhaps as Members get more used to debates such as this, more of them will return to hear the concluding remarks.

I certainly will work with the devolved Governments in respect of their responsibilities. Responding to the comments of the hon. Member for South Down (Ms Ritchie), I have serious concerns about the market as it operates in Northern Ireland. I am not responsible for the market, however; that is a Treasury matter, which is why the Treasury took the recent debate. I also understand that the Northern Ireland regulators are conducting a review, and I can assure the hon. Lady that if there is any evidence of collusion in the market—if any cartels are operating there or here—we will come down on them like a ton of bricks, as would be only right and proper.

As the Transport Committee has concluded, there is not just one simple solution to this problem. I agree, for instance, that there is a postcode lottery. In some ways, that is similar to the gender issue we have just discussed. Some postcodes cover large areas; that is certainly the case in my part of the world. It is fundamentally wrong for people to be penalised because of the road or neighbourhood in which they happen to live. Insurance calculations used to be based on theft and damage rates, but modern cars are very difficult to steal. Joyriders still steal ordinary cars, but most vehicle thefts are of high-value cars that are stolen to order. That is a completely different kind of theft from the thefts that affect premiums.

Let us consider why premiums are so high. It is not just to do with uninsured drivers. It is also to do with ambulance chasers. Some 50% of all personal injury claims are made on car insurance. How can that be right when, as we have heard this evening, we have some of the safest roads in the world, and certainly the safest roads in Europe? Our killed and seriously-injured rates are extremely low, although we need to get them even lower. The truth of the matter is that most of these claims, many of which are fraudulent, are not reported to the police. Very often they are reported after the incident; Members have referred to constituents saying people followed up on incidents the following day. The hon. Member for Lewisham West and Penge (Jim Dowd) touched on this in his speech. The police would never have been called in such cases; it will never be on the records of the police that that sort of thing has taken place. Some countries in Europe, including Germany, have carefully considered the speed that someone would have had to be travelling to be in an accident before they can claim for whiplash. I was with the relevant German Minister at a conference recently, and we discussed this and other measures, particularly priority. The evidence is that this does not appear to be working in Germany simply because people are increasing the speed that they claim they were travelling at before the accident.

[John Woodcock]

I just want the Minister to set out why he has rejected our calls to restrict whiplash claims, given the seriousness of this problem in forcing up insurance premiums. Will he not reconsider?

[Mike Penning]

I have not rejected that; this was done by a colleague in the Ministry of Justice, as it is a legal matter. However, I completely agree with my colleague, as he is a legal person and I am not. There are legal differences between Germany and this country. Everything is possible, and this Parliament can do whatever it wants to do. [Interruption.] Perhaps that is not the case—I see some of my Eurosceptic friends in the House this evening. There are certain things that I would like to be doing in my Department that Europe prevents me from doing.

As we have heard across the House today, insurers have to take responsibility and say, “No, we’ll take you to court and we will challenge this.” They should not just settle out of court because it happens to be cheaper than the possible consequences of going to court. Immediately we start to do that, the no win, no fee ambulance chasers will look very carefully at their cases, and people who should genuinely get their compensation will get it and those who are swinging a leg, as my grandfather would say, will not. I shall refer back to my time on the Select Committee on Health, because it is not just in this area that we have this problem with insurance. Our hospitals, in particular, tend to settle out of court rather than challenging claims, and that is costing the taxpayer and the NHS an absolute fortune, so this is a culture that we have to turn around.

Hon. Members have touched on other aspects in the report and the evidence to the Select Committee. I have significantly changed the driving test, the practical and the theory, since my appointment, and I intend to change it even more. I have said it before and I will say it again that people are currently taught to pass a test; they are not taught to drive. They are not taught to drive safely for themselves and for others, and we have to make sure that we have qualified driving instructors and that everybody knows they are qualified when they get into that car. One change we are going to make—I hope that the Select Committee will agree with me on this—is that someone who is not a qualified driving instructor will not be able to take someone out on their own to teach them to drive. I am not going to stop parents, grandparents and sisters doing that, but someone who gets into a car marked “driving instructor” should not have to look for a little badge on the windscreen that says that the person is a trainee. These people should be qualified driving instructors. The industry supports me on this and we will do this. There also has to be an ongoing training programme for driving instructors. Some instructors took their qualifications many years ago, and we need to make sure that they are au fait with what we want from the driving test, although we also want them to earn an income.

As we have heard today, there are also things that happen to people suddenly when they pass their driving test. Clearly, some people—young people in particular, but not all of them—appear to have some kind of lobotomy when they get behind the wheel of a car. I am talking about highly intelligent young people who are perfect role models in every other aspect of their life, and then they get behind the wheel of a car. Sadly, as has been discussed, testosterone is one of the leading factors. Drink and drugs are involved, but testosterone is one of the big problems here.

In my constituency, the place where most people pass their test is St Albans. Between my constituency and St Albans is a rather large motorway called the M1, and to get back from the test centre, people have to cross it. That means that someone could be driving for the first time on their own and as they turn left or right to come off the A414 they will be on the M1. I think we need to give people, particularly young people, the opportunity to learn how to drive on the motorway before they pass their test. That is why we will pass regulations to allow qualified driving instructors to take learners on to motorways. Can I make that compulsory? No, I cannot because some counties have no motorways, so it would be discriminatory to do so, but we will give qualified instructors the opportunity to do that.

We need to make sure that the test is not the endgame, but not—in my opinion or that of the Government—to make it compulsory to take post-test qualifications. Pass Plus was a partial success, but was never really rolled out properly.

[Jim Dowd]

Before I came to the House, I used to drive extensively on the motorway network—in my company car, for those who were listening earlier—and the idea of the odd learner turning up on the motorway is strange. Traffic on our motorways travels at much higher speeds generally. Would it not be better to allow people to pass the traditional test and then take an additional period of tuition on the motorway, rather than allow someone who might have been behind the wheel of a car for only two or three hours suddenly to turn up on a motorway alongside juggernauts and fast-driving cars? The Minister will know better than anyone that the average speed on motorways is much higher than the 70 mph limit.

--- Later in debate ---

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)]

Order. Minister, I realise that driving on motorways is a very important subject, but I have a feeling that you were going to bring the debate back to the cost of motoring.

[Mike Penning]

An integral part of driving and the cost of insurance is how people are qualified to drive. That is why qualifications, as well as the ordinary driving test, are specifically mentioned in the report we are discussing, which is why I was speaking to the issue. However, I shall take your guidance, Madam Deputy Speaker, and steer towards more detailed work on the black box.

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

Order. I am very sorry, but I was trying to ensure that the Minister stayed where he wanted to be, whereas the hon. Member for Lewisham West and Penge (Jim Dowd) was tempting him away. I do not need a gentle rebuke from the Minister; I thought I was helping him.

[Mike Penning]

I know you too well ever to rebuke you, Madam Deputy Speaker, and I would never be led astray by the hon. Gentleman.

I do not agree with the hon. Gentleman. We have a situation in which young people—or, indeed, anyone—passing their test today can go on the motorway. There are no restrictions on that, and we need to give them the necessary skills. I have a full car, full motorbike, HGV and tank licence to boot, and I have driven on the motorway in all types of vehicle, so I understand. I have an H licence. The hon. Gentleman was indicating from a sedentary position, “What is a tank licence?”—it is an H licence for tracked vehicles.

Let me touch on issues of technology. As we heard earlier, some insurers have been using technology, particularly the black box. The Co-operative insurance company, which was mentioned earlier, has a scheme that encourages people to take the box in their car, and it monitors very carefully what speed one is travelling at, what time of day one is driving—nearly everything. I have been pushing quite extensively with insurers to roll that out further. It is the obvious way forward. If people are given the responsibility of a driving licence, they can be given the opportunity of responsibility. However, insurance companies have to be transparent. We have to know why the premiums are what they are and how they can best be broken down so that the public, when they look at their premium, know exactly what they are getting for their money. If there is a discount, we need to know exactly what it is and that if the person who takes out that policy sticks rigidly to the agreement their premium will not shoot up the following year or month.

In conclusion, I think this has been a very sensible debate. I welcome the report from the Committee chaired by the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside and I think that we can agree on most things. We have many, many Committees sitting already; one more would be quite difficult. We meet regularly on a cross-party basis to discuss these matters, and myriad Departments can be involved, depending on the issue in question.

At the moment, we are doing a great deal of work on penalties, which I have not yet touched on, and on the question of whether fines are the answer. The Secretary of State for Work and Pensions has already announced that he is going to allow fines to be increased for those on benefits. At the moment, the figure is £5, but that will increase to £25. I personally think that, as well as looking at increasing fines, we need to look at the points. In most cases, people will be prepared to pay a fine, but they might find the prospect of getting additional points on their licence more of a deterrent. They might decide that getting an extra six points, rather than just three, might mean losing their licence. I hope that such a move might prevent more people from driving while uninsured.

[Karl MᶜCartney]

I understand what my hon. Friend is saying about points. Is there not also a need to make it socially unacceptable to drive while uninsured? Would it perhaps be prudent to consider a prison sentence for people who seem determined to do it three, four of five times or who have been involved in a serious accident while uninsured?

[Mike Penning]

I thank my hon. Friend for that point. We will continue to look at the penalties involved. Those of us who came through the drink-driving campaigns of the ’70s and ’80s will remember how we turned drink-drivers into pariahs, but that involved educating the public first, then using a big stick. We did the same with seat belts, and we now need to do it with drug-driving as well as with uninsured driving. We will continue to look at this, but, at the end of the day, it is for the magistrates and the courts to decide how they interpret the law. They have a degree of autonomy, which is why so many drivers who have more than 12 points have kept their licence. It is a matter for the courts to interpret the special needs of the people involved, and perhaps the lawyers who represent them are also a factor. I was shocked when I saw the figures, and it was my own Department that released them.

I know that the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside is going to respond to the debate. Her Committee has produced an excellent report, and we have had an excellent debate. I look forward to implementing many of the measures that have been mentioned, so that our roads can continue to be the safest in Europe and among the safest in the world.

Transport

Mike Penning Excerpts

Thursday 3rd November 2011 Ministerial Corrections

[Maria Eagle]

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what the projected change is in the number of investigators at the Marine Accident Investigation Branch over the period of the current spending review.

[Official Report, 31 October 2011, Vol. 534, c. 418W.]

Letter of correction from Mike Penning:

An error has been identified in the written answer given to the hon. Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle) on 31 October 2011.

The full answer given was as follows:

[Mike Penning]

[holding answer 24 October 2011]: Under plans to reduce its costs in line with the outcome of the October 2010 spending review, the number of MAIB investigators will be reduced from 21 to 16.

The correct answer should have been:

[Mike Penning]

[holding answer 24 October 2011]: Under plans to reduce its costs in line with the outcome of the October 2010 spending review, the number of MAIB investigators has already been reduced from 21 to 18, and will reduce further to 17 by the end of this month and to 16 by March.

Historic Vehicles (MOT Exemption)

Mike Penning Excerpts

Thursday 3rd November 2011 Written Statements

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mike Penning)]

The Department for Transport has today published a consultation on a proposal to exempt vehicles of historic interest (vehicles manufactured prior to 1 January 1960) in Great Britain (GB) from the statutory MOT test, as allowed under article 4(2) of the EU Directive 2009/40/EC.

The EU directive of the European Parliament and of the Council, Chapter II, Exceptions, Article 4 states:

“Member States may, after consulting the Commission, exclude from the scope of this Directive, or subject to special provisions, certain vehicles operated or used in exceptional conditions and vehicles which are never, or hardly ever, used on public highways, including vehicles of historic interest which were manufactured before 1 January 1960 or which are temporarily withdrawn from circulation. Member States may, after consulting the Commission, set their own testing standards for vehicles considered to be of historic interest.'”

Sections 45 to 48 of the Road Traffic Act 1988 provide the legislative basis for MOT testing. The purpose of the MOT test is to ensure that cars, other light vehicles (including some light goods vehicles), private buses and motorcycles over a prescribed age are checked at least once a year to see that they comply with key roadworthiness and environmental requirements in the Road Vehicle Construction and Use Regulations 1986 and the Road Vehicle Lighting Regulations 1989 (both as amended).

While it is important to ensure that vehicles are safe to use on the highway, it is also important to ensure that regulations imposed are not excessive. Currently, both the age and the categories of vehicles requiring the MOT test in GB go further than the EU directive on roadworthiness test 2009/40/EC, which only subjects post-1960 registered vehicles to a compulsory roadworthiness test and does not require motorcycles of any age to do a statutory roadworthiness test.

The Government believe that the proposed exemption will reduce regulatory burden on owners of historic vehicles, meet its reducing regulation agenda and the desire to remove unnecessary burdens. It will also bring the age of vehicles requiring the statutory MOT test in line with the Goods Vehicles (Plating and Testing) Regulations 1988, which already exempts unladen pre-1960 manufactured heavy goods vehicles from the roadworthiness test.

Two thirds of pre-1960 licensed vehicles (vehicles manufactured prior to 1 January 1960) are driven less than 500 miles each year. This is significantly less than the 9,000 miles driven on average by all licensed vehicles.

While the pre-1960 licensed vehicles made up about 0.6% of the approximately 35.2 million licensed vehicles in GB in 2010, they were involved in just 0.03% of road casualties and accidents. The pre-1960 licensed vehicles are largely well maintained by their owners. The initial MOT test failure rate for these vehicles in 2009 was less than 10%, while the initial MOT test failure rate for post-1960 licensed vehicles was over 30%.

The purpose of the consultation is to invite views on proposals to exempt vehicles of historic interest from the statutory MOT test in GB. In addition to no change, the consultation offers three options based on vehicle manufactured date—that is, it seeks respondents’ views on whether the Government should exempt from the statutory MOT test pre-1960, pre-1945 or pre-1920 manufactured vehicles.

The consultation also seeks respondents’ views (in all three options) on whether all vehicle categories and vehicles used for commercial purposes should be included in the exemption review.

The consultation will run until 26 January 2012. Copies of the consultation document have been placed on the Library of the House. Further copies are available on the DFT website at: www.dft.gov.uk/consultations/dft-2011-27. Depending on comments received and the Department’s response, amendments may be made to regulations.