Severn Bridges (Tolls)

Richard Burden Excerpts

Tuesday 21st July 2015 Westminster Hall

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

I add my congratulations to those that have been given to my hon. Friend the Member for Newport East (Jessica Morden) on securing this important debate and on her years of tireless campaigning on the issue. The same is true of other hon. Members, some of whom we have heard from today, including the Chair of the Welsh Affairs Committee, the hon. Member for Monmouth (David T. C. Davies), who made an important contribution. The hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards) praised himself and his colleagues for their dynamism, and my hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn (Chris Evans) managed to achieve what I would have thought the impossible feat of getting Ronald Reagan into the debate. Finally, the hon. Member for Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey (Drew Hendry) managed to work in Robert Graves, so that was great creativity.

This is clearly a cross-party issue. It is clear that the crossings are an important transport link between England and Wales, playing a vital role for businesses and the economy as well as keeping friends and families in our two countries connected. So it is unfortunate that the cost and experience of using the crossings has been a source of such frustration for so long. I had a sense of déjà vu when I heard about this debate; then I recalled that it was almost exactly a year ago when my hon. Friend the Member for Newport East last obtained a debate on the issue. Something that has come across clearly today—I hope that the Minister has heard it—is the frustration shared by many hon. Members about the fact that the debate seems hardly to have moved on in a year. Today’s debate is my hon. Friend’s third Westminster Hall debate on the issue in five years, and the issues that have been raised show that there is still a lot more to do.

The Severn crossings provide an important link in Wales’s transport and economic infrastructure, and they are essential to the Welsh economy. As we have heard, 80,000 vehicles use the crossings every day. It is important that the toll price should provide a fair balance between the cost of better infrastructure and the benefits to the people using the bridge. It has been made clear in this debate that the costs of the Severn crossing tolls seem unfair. Road users relying on the crossings have been hit hard by an inflexible system and an old-fashioned payment system with annual rises until 2018. The charges are the highest of any crossing on the strategic road network. As my hon. Friend said, the current prices are £6.50 for a car, £13.10 for a light goods vehicle and £19.60 for an HGV. On the Humber bridge, a car now pays just £1.50 and an HGV £12. That is a huge issue for people who are already struggling. Transport is a major part of household budgets—a point that my hon. Friend made powerfully.

The Government may point out their commitment to scrapping VAT on tolls and removing the second tier that penalises vans after 2018. However, that does not solve the problem for private drivers or businesses. Private drivers will still have to fork out thousands before VAT is scrapped in 2018. Even then the toll price will still be significantly higher, as far as we can tell, than comparable tolls in the UK.

There are precedents for things that the Government could do. Since 2014 local people eligible for the resident discount scheme at the Dartford crossing have been able to make unlimited trips across for just £20 a year, ensuring that a toll on the strategic road network does not hinder local mobility. In the debate in 2014, I and other hon. Members recognised that there would be a challenge in defining “local” in relation to the Severn bridge and deciding where any discount would start and end, but that challenge underlines why the UK Government must develop the right kind of dialogue and forum with the Welsh Government and local authorities, so that they can look ahead and find a solution to the issue.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Newport East made clear, such practical issues need to be addressed, and they are certainly not addressed by coming out with a lot of rhetoric about English votes for English laws. The situation is a practical example of the necessity of co-operation. The Welsh Affairs Committee also emphasised that in 2011. Will the Minister set out what assessment his Department is undertaking of introducing a local residents’ scheme or some other flexible payment system for the Severn crossings, and what involvement other authorities have had in the matter so far?

Obviously, the tolls not only affect commuters and private drivers but have a significant impact on local businesses and the local economy. Many hon. Members have made that point, including my hon. Friend the Member for Llanelli (Nia Griffith). For local businesses, the excessive tolls are a cost that competitors elsewhere simply do not have to pay. We have heard claims that they can add up to £200,000 to a business’s bottom line. Sadly, the benefit of scrapping VAT will be minimal, particularly for HGVs and the freight industry, as they already claim VAT back on the toll. There will be savings only in processing the claims.

Again, the Dartford crossing is a good example of how we could develop best practice, in that it operates an off-peak concession for drivers at night, which benefits HGVs. Surely we can look at some kind of off-peak concession in the case of the Severn bridges. I therefore ask the Government what assessment they are making of waiving tolls for night-time crossings or devising an off-peak concession. I remember that in the debate in March of last year, the Minister’s predecessor, the hon. Member for Scarborough and Whitby (Mr Goodwill), said that the Eurovignette directive currently imposes a 13% cap on discounts for HGVs, but that the discount currently stood only at 10%. I would be grateful if the Minister could update the House on whether those rates are still the same.

A number of hon. Members, including my hon. Friends the Members for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock) and for Islwyn, my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Wayne David), who mentioned local government, and the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon), who brings experience from Northern Ireland, have said that tolls can have a big impact on economic growth. The Welsh Assembly has estimated an economic loss just for Wales of about £80 million a year. With the debt expected to be about £88 million in 2018, has the Minister received any representations about offsetting any of the debt with the toll rate in order to boost the local economy?

I have referred a lot to south Wales, but of course this is not simply about south Wales. The tolls have knock-on effects in England, such as congestion in places such as the Forest of Dean, which limit the whole region’s economy—something that the Government say they are trying to act on. Will the Minister therefore consider carrying out an economic impact study like the Welsh Assembly’s but including south-west England as well as Wales? Does he agree that when the necessary long-term strategy is being developed, it will be important to reach out to local enterprise partnerships and chambers of commerce as well as local authorities?

Next I want to consider the failure to modernise—a point made powerfully by my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty). We have heard today and in previous debates that the issue is not simply the cost of the crossing but the lack of convenience in how the tolls must be paid. More than a year later, road users without cash still have to enter their PIN into a handheld device, which takes time and slows transit. During last year’s debate, the Minister’s predecessor refused to consider technology enhancements that could speed up queues because, he said, the long-term future of the charging arrangements was not clear. That, I respectfully put to him, is the point that we have been making in this debate and previous debates—that is what needs to be sorted out. It is obvious that some form of toll charge will be in place after 2018 to cover maintenance costs, but I hope that the Minister will commit today to taking account of technological developments in considering how the tolls will be paid and in the long-term strategy.

Simpler solutions could be adopted. I have mentioned the Dartford crossing, and although I do not want to diverge too much from the subject of the debate, Mr Gray, I will just ask the Minister as an aside whether he has any news about the problems there, not with free flow itself but with unpaid notices. What discussions has he had with Highways England and Severn River Crossing plc on introducing contactless payment on the Severn bridge?

The questions that I have for the future are as follows. We have talked about reforms to pricing and payment that could benefit users, but they do not fundamentally address the main issue—that the concession will soon end. I reflected on the debt standing at £88 million. Can the Minister clarify that that is still the case? Can he also offer a more transparent breakdown of the debt, as well as the maintenance costs of both bridges?

The end date for the concession, as we know, is 2018. At that stage the crossing will revert to public ownership, and a decision about how the debt will be recovered and about future toll charges must therefore be made. When will the Government make those decisions? How, in practice, will they work in partnership with the Welsh Assembly and Severn River Crossing plc to prepare for that? The longer we wait, the longer users will have to endure the high charges and inconvenience that they have been enduring for too long.

I hope that the Minister will leave the debate having given us some reassurance on the important questions that my hon. Friends and other hon. Members have asked, and having given a commitment that there will be regular updates on what the Government are considering, whom they are talking to, what ideas are being developed and how the technology will be improved. We do not want to end up in yet another debate, at this time next year, asking the same questions but without any further information about what the Government will do in practice. The crossings are vital for the Welsh economy, the English economy and the co-operation that is so important between our two countries, so I hope that this time the Minister will give the House rather firmer information about how we will go forward than has been the case in the previous four debates.

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[Andrew Jones]

I cannot give the hon. Lady a final date, but I can tell her that that work has started and is taking place in the Department, with colleagues in the Wales Office. Let me leave hon. Members in no doubt that the Government are committed to the successful operation of the crossings. They are vital, and the economies on both sides have benefited greatly from their presence.

[Richard Burden]

I think that the Minister may inadvertently have misunderstood my hon. Friend’s question. She was not asking him when the Government will make their final decision; we understand that that will take some time. She was asking for a timetable or road map of the process whereby decisions will be made. Who will be talked to at which stage? Which agenda items will be discussed at which stage—the debt, toll levels, the technology, off-peak reductions? In the autumn, can the Minister give some kind of timetable for when those things will be considered?

[Andrew Jones]

I mentioned earlier that we are already committed by the road investment strategy to work with the Welsh Government, and we are more than happy to continue with all the strategy commitments. As I said, I have already started work with my colleagues in the Wales Office. I am expecting more work to be done over the summer and in the early autumn by my officials in the Department, and will be more than happy to share it more widely as we go forward, but I cannot yet give a specific date. However, it is work in progress, and we are starting that work. It will certainly involve wide co-operation and consultation.

Oral Answers to Questions

Richard Burden Excerpts

Thursday 16th July 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Goodwill]

There is a cross-party initiative on air quality. I should add that I came in on my bicycle this morning, so I have not contributed to any of the air quality problems in London.

We need to make further progress in rolling out low-emission vehicles, while ensuring that the electricity they use is produced in a sustainable way.

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

Figures published this week show the scale of the air quality challenge that faces London, in addition to the carbon dioxide challenge that faces us all, and other towns and cities have similar challenges ahead. Why, in the Budget, did the Chancellor impose a financial penalty on hybrid and plug-in hybrid vehicles, putting them in the same band as cars with far higher emissions? Is it not time that the Chancellor talked to the Transport Secretary, and that both of them listened to what the industry is telling them?

[Mr Goodwill]

When consumers are deciding which vehicle to buy, they will consider not only the level of vehicle excise duty that they will pay—which, incidentally, will be zero in the case of the very cleanest cars—but the total life cost of the fuel that they will use. It is pretty much a no-brainer to buy the most fuel-efficient car possible, and to opt for a plug-in vehicle if that suits the consumer’s lifestyle.

Oral Answers to Questions

Richard Burden Excerpts

Thursday 11th June 2015 Commons Chamber

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

This was the week in which Ministers boasted that they were going to cut red tape by replacing the counterpart driving licence with an online system. That is a good objective. The trouble is that the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency’s computer system has already crashed under the strain. Motorists who want to hire a car abroad now have to contact the DVLA online and obtain a code in order to access the same information that they would previously have had in their pocket, and if they do not hire the car within three days, they will have to go back to square one because the code will have expired. Mr Speaker, you could not make it up! Cutting red tape? It’s a mess, isn’t it?

[Mr McLoughlin]

The simple fact is that people do not have to do that online; they can phone. There was a problem on the first morning of the new system, but since then it has been operating successfully.

Oral Answers to Questions

Richard Burden Excerpts

Thursday 5th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Goodwill]

We have made it absolutely clear that all our new road schemes must be cycle-proofed to ensure that we do not have a situation where a new roundabout or bypass prevents cyclists from making their journeys too.

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

Confidence in road safety is key to increasing rates of cycling and walking, but after decades of progress, last year saw three consecutive increases in road deaths. Answers to parliamentary questions have revealed a dramatic reduction in the number of prosecutions for dangerous drink-driving and mobile offences at the wheel. With the number of traffic officers down by 23% since 2010 and apparently two years without any at all in Devon and Cornwall, whether these things are the fault of Transport Ministers, Home Office Ministers or even the Prime Minister himself, is it not the reality that the Government have failed to protect front-line policing and keep our roads safe? Is it not right for the next Labour Government to reintroduce proper targets to cut the number of deaths and serious injuries on our roads?

[Mr Goodwill]

We do have targets for the Highways Agency network, which we have control over. Other roads are the responsibility of highways agencies. When I stood at the Opposition Dispatch Box five years ago and put it to the Labour Government that we should introduce drug-driving legislation, they said it was impossible. I am proud to say that on Monday this week we gave the police the tools they need to prosecute those who put other road users in danger by drug-driving, and we now have the legislation on the statute book to do that—something that Labour said was impossible.

Harvey’s Law

Richard Burden Excerpts

Monday 2nd March 2015 Westminster Hall

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Halton (Derek Twigg) on securing this debate, and the more than 100,000 people who have so far signed the petition calling for Harvey’s law. As my hon. Friend said, it shows that democracy can work and can have an impact, and that people power can get concerns heard in this place. To that extent, congratulations are also due to the Backbench Business Committee for organising this debate; it is good to see the Chair of the Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for North East Derbyshire (Natascha Engel), here.

I am winding up this debate on behalf of two important bodies: one is the official Opposition, and the other is Charlie, my cat, who has given me special dispensation to be here. Normally he complains a lot when I leave on a Monday, but today he said, “Get yourself down there.” Charlie is a survivor of a road collision. He came in looking very much the worse for wear, but it could have been a lot worse. He made a full recovery, at least physically; he has been a lot more clingy since then. All of us who are pet owners know what it feels like when a pet is involved in a road incident or, worse, as we have heard in this debate, when a pet does not come home and we do not know what has happened to it.

If I have done my figures right, we have heard from 16 hon. Members from across the House who have been united. It is rare to find such a degree of unanimity in this place. Everybody spoke with great feeling, and often from personal experience of having a pet and knowing how it becomes an integral part of the family, and of what it is like not knowing what has happened to it. I was also interested in the speech made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley (Mr Howarth), who gave us the historical perspective. I have to say that until I heard his speech I was not aware that the relationship between humans and animals, particularly dogs, played a role in the progression from the Neanderthal race to the human race. I am glad that I now know it, and it should certainly give the UK Independence party something to think about in the period ahead.

[Mr George Howarth]

I do not think that any scientists would take issue with the fact that there was a progression from the Neanderthals to the human race, because I do not think that dogs are the missing link.

[Richard Burden]

I will try to think of a witty response to that, but for the moment it is failing me.

It is really important that hon. Members have spoken up on behalf of not only the human race’s best friends, but pet owners. As the debate has shown, the public care deeply about pets and are concerned about their well-being. I understand that about 9 million households in the UK own a dog, and the House certainly has a responsibility to be concerned for the well-being of all those dogs, as we do for animal welfare more generally. My hon. Friend the Member for Garston and Halewood (Maria Eagle) recently set out Labour’s intent to lead the way on animal welfare with six important commitments, from ending the badger cull to reviewing the rules on the breeding and selling of dogs and cats. It is with that last commitment in mind that the Opposition approach this debate, which has rightly included important and passionate contributions from Members from all parts of the House.

The Minister has already been asked a number of questions by hon. Members. I hope that he will be able to answer them; we are all looking forward to hearing his response. I may add a couple of questions myself. We have heard about Harvey’s sad death and the 13 weeks of suffering endured by his owners, Judith Devine and Shaun Robertson, because the Highways Agency guidance, as set out in the network management manual, just was not followed. I remind hon. Members that that guidance was published in 2009, and it sets out procedures for a number of Highways Agency area maintenance contractors when animals are found on the roads. It specifies that identification information must be collected and a search made for a collar and disc, and that owners must be notified as soon as possible. Where no collar or disc is found, the entire body of the animal must be scanned for microchips and ears checked for tattoos, and the appropriate authorities must be notified, whether that be the police or the local authority dog warden. If none of this information can be found but the animal is clearly a dog, it will be kept and as much information as possible must be passed on to the local police or dog warden.

This guidance just could not have been followed in Harvey’s case, and we have heard of other cases where it has not been followed. In 2013-14, 189 dogs and 213 cats were reported dead on the Highways Agency network. The Harvey’s Army campaign has told us in its e-mails and other approaches that numerous pets were killed on the roadside and disposed of without their owners being informed; we have also heard examples of that today.

Judith and Shaun wrote to the shadow transport team about this issue last year, and we raised a number of parliamentary questions that clearly showed that there is no standardised procedure for identifying, recording and managing animal fatalities on the road network.

We believe that people who have had their dog microchipped deserve to be treated with consideration and respect. It is also important that there is consistency across the Highways Agency, its contractors, local authorities and the police in how canine fatalities are handled, to ensure that both animals and their owners are treated with the respect they deserve. The point about the importance of a joined-up approach was made forcefully by my hon. Friend the Member for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne). Against that background, I was pleased to see in yesterday’s press that the Minister will agree with that point today. I hope that if new guidance is issued, it will provide pet owners with confidence that a consistent procedure will be followed. What we have seen and heard today is that that is not the case at the moment. However, there is another problem; the Government’s decision to scrap mandatory procedures for animal identification in maintenance and management contracts for the strategic road network is part of the picture.

I understand that the Highways Agency has been awarding these new contracts, which do not have a mandatory scanning policy, as a result of decisions made in 2010. The Highways Agency has denied that the change in contract had any part in the failure to identify Harvey, and says that contractors “may” still continue to scan for a chip when an animal is found and would

“attempt to reunite the owner with the animal whenever possible”.

However, that just does not ring true. If procedures are made voluntary, rather than mandatory, of course it is less likely that they will be followed. Even if they are followed in a number of cases, the frequency with which they are followed will decline. I hope that the Minister can tell us today why the decision to remove mandatory scanning was taken, who called for it and what the rationale behind it was. Also, if that decision was about saving money, how much money is it estimated to save?

[Sir Tony Cunningham]

Talking about savings, perhaps if the Highways Agency stopped putting up big signs along all the roads of Britain saying “Highways Agency”, it could afford to implement Harvey’s law.

[Richard Burden]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. All I would say in response now is: please do not get me started on broader issues concerning the Highways Agency. The Minister and I had numerous discussions about the Highways Agency during consideration of the Infrastructure Bill recently, and I fear that I would be stretching your patience too far, Mr Rosindell, if I got on to some of those points now.

On the issue of compulsory microchipping, the Highways Agency states that scanning “may” still occur. Presumably, most contractors will have the necessary equipment; if such scanning “may” still occur, the assumption must be that most of them have the equipment required. Surely, therefore, the duty cannot be particularly burdensome.

The decision to end mandatory scanning seems even more misguided given that the Government have just passed regulations that will require all dog owners to microchip their dog by April 2016. The Government have said that microchipping is a welfare measure that will increase traceability and allow lost dogs to be reunited with their owners more quickly—and amen to that. However, that will not necessarily happen if the procedures that authorities are meant to follow in order to identify pets and inform their owners are being watered down at the same time. It just is not right that the Government are introducing obligations on dog owners but removing them from their own agencies, or indeed their own companies, given that the Highways Agency, as a result of the Infrastructure Bill, has recently become a Government-owned company called Highways England.

As the British Veterinary Association has said:

“Responsible owners who have had their dogs microchipped and kept their details up to date should have a reasonable expectation that steps will be taken by the authorities to contact them if their dog is lost, injured or, sadly, found dead. As the UK moves towards compulsory microchipping of all dogs, the Government should be taking the opportunity to espouse the benefits of microchipping rather than eroding them.”

The Opposition agree with that, and we support mandatory identification procedures for the Highways Agency to follow.

Harvey’s law proposes a simple solution: that the procedures for scanning, identification and recording set out in the Highways Agency’s network management manual be not only kept in place but strengthened by legislation. Many others, such as the Dogs Trust, support that obligation too, and are calling for mandatory scanning of dogs on the roads and railways. However, we are rather confused about what the Government’s policy is in this regard, and I hope that the Minister will clear that up when responding to the debate.

I understand that, previously, the stated position was that the Government had no plans to enforce mandatory scanning through legislation, but from yesterday’s press we understand that the Minister has asked the Highways Agency to review the scanning policy. Likewise, the Highways Agency recently stated that it is currently assessing the

“potential merits of amending contracts”

to include mandatory identification, recording and notification for owners. I think everybody here today could identify the benefits pretty quickly; we would not need a big review to do that. They are: rapid identification; less distress to owners; and quicker reunification of dogs and owners.

We need a bit more clarity on these reviews and assessments to ensure that the issue is being taken seriously quickly in the Department for Transport. I hope that today the Minister will provide us with more details of what these reviews will consist of; what their terms of reference are; when conclusions are expected; and when a decision is expected on the basis of those conclusions.

Although I like the Minister a great deal, so far we have had a jumble of different statements from the Government and the Highways Agency, and that has not given Harvey’s Army, or the millions of other dog owners in the UK, the confidence they need and deserve that the pets they will have an obligation to microchip will be treated with the consideration, compassion and respect that they are calling for. Sadly, it just seems to be another indication of muddle.

From Labour’s point of view, getting this sorted out is part of the same approach to animal welfare that underlines our position on the badger cull, and our wish not to see the ban on hunting with dogs watered down or removed. As my right hon. Friend the Member for Doncaster North (Edward Miliband) has said:

“Our Labour values tell us that we have a moral duty to treat the animals we share our planet with in a humane and compassionate way.”

That is why Labour has committed to ensuring that it is mandatory for the Highways Agency to carry out these identification procedures. As my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley East (Michael Dugher), the shadow Transport Secretary, has said, these are simple procedures but they make a big difference to people. We do not think that mandating Government agencies and authorities to follow these procedures—making it compulsory—is too much to ask. That should be done quickly. I hope that the Minister agrees with me. I look forward to his response.

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[Mr Hayes]

Yes, that is true, and it should make the commitment I have given easier to deliver. We will ensure that facilities are in place across the country to scan animals that are unhappily in the circumstances I have set out.

The Government take this matter extremely seriously. As soon as I heard about the case, I realised that the circumstance in which Harvey died was just not acceptable, for the reasons I gave at the outset. If we are made more human by the love of a pet, we need to understand that when a pet is lost and its fate is uncertain—my hon. Friend the Member for Stourbridge (Margot James) made this point wonderfully—that eats at the hearts of all those involved. To paraphrase Dickens, what greater gift can there be than the love of a cat or dog?

[Richard Burden]

I am not going to try to match the Minister’s quotations, but, for the benefit of those following the debate, I want to get absolutely clear the commitments that have been given. Would I be right in thinking that there are three? First, that new contracts will make scanning mandatory, with no delay, and so will not be preceded by a review—

[Mr Hayes]

That is already happening.

[Richard Burden]

Secondly, that a review will apply to existing contracts and the Minister will write to all Members present with a timetable, which will be placed in the House of Commons Library; and thirdly, that the requirements will be extended to cats. Will the Minister give some idea of the timetable for that final commitment?

[Mr Hayes]

I could not have summarised my own argument better than the shadow Minister has just done. Those are indeed the commitments. In the note that I will circulate on the contracts, it would be helpful for me to say a word about cats and the practicable means of contacting owners. I take the point that cats are often microchipped. As I was saying, that helps because of the availability of scanners and the fact that, as has been said in the debate, the straightforward business of locating and collecting animals in places where they can be scanned should mean that owners can be contacted wherever possible.

Infrastructure Bill [Lords]

Richard Burden Excerpts

Monday 26th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hayes]

I will make a little progress and then let the hon. Gentleman come back.

The Bill provides that a transferring employee can terminate their contract if there is a substantial detrimental change to it if they transfer. That reflects regulation 4(9) of TUPE. Government amendment 116 supplements that by providing that where the employee claims constructive dismissal in those circumstances, no damages are payable in respect of any unpaid wages that relate to a notice period he or she has not worked. I should stress that the amendment does not prevent employees from claiming for damages for constructive dismissal, but seeks to establish a common-sense position that damages cannot be claimed for a period of required notice that has not been worked. I should highlight that the amendment ensures that the provisions in the Bill properly reflect TUPE in that regard.

[Richard Burden]

I should like to press the Minister to clarify Government amendment 116. From what he has said, it seems that the intention is to put the TUPE principles into the Bill. The amendment contains the words “constructive dismissal”. It seems to me—this is certainly the advice we have had—that that is inappropriate. Will he look again?

[Mr Hayes]

The hon. Gentleman, with the courtesy he personifies, raised that with me before we came to the House today. I have committed to take another look at that through the parliamentary draftsman. There is no intention to disadvantage staff in that regard. I give that absolute assurance, but I will double-check the language, because language in such things matters. He and I are in discussion and I have committed to write to him as soon as possible, and certainly before the matter is discussed further, to clarify the use of the language to which he has drawn the House’s attention.

--- Later in debate ---

In short, these changes will lead us towards the effective, long-term planning and development of the world-class national road infrastructure that road users deserve. In that spirit and with that confidence, bold, but humble—because, as I said, we must listen and learn through the process of scrutiny—I am proud to commend the Government’s new clauses and ask that the other amendments, which would create a very different model, be withdrawn.

[Richard Burden]

Time is clearly short, so I will be as brief as I can be in having to cover a wide range of amendments and issues.

The Minister began by mentioning the walking and cycling issues covered by the amendments and new clauses. For too long, walking and cycling have been an afterthought in transport policy, given attention only when the end of the list is reached and the tick needs to be put in the box. There is now widespread consensus on the need for change. Getting more people walking and cycling will improve our nation’s health, tackle congestion and make our towns and cities better places to live.

We lag behind many other countries. Just 2% of overall journeys are made by bike and walking levels continue to decline. Some 64% of all journeys are made by car, but more than half of them are shorter than five miles, with a fifth being under a mile. We need to move walking and cycling to the mainstream of transport policy. We raised that point time after time in the other place and in Committee. In the other place, Labour secured an explicit consideration of pedestrian and cyclist safety in the Bill, and that is to be welcomed. In Committee, we pressed the Government to include a long-term strategy and funding for active travel, but sadly they voted against our plans. One always welcomes a sinner who repents, but if that was the Government’s intention all along, why did they oppose our amendments in Committee?

The Government’s change of course is a credit to the cross-party members of the all-party cycling group; to cycling groups such as British Cycling and the CTC; to transport campaigners such as Living Streets, Sustrans, the Campaign for Better Transport and the Campaign to Protect Rural England; and the Richmond group of health charities. They have all put the right kind of pressure on in the past two weeks to secure this change, which we welcome.

The new clauses and amendments tabled by the Minister are almost identical to those tabled earlier, with the exception that the original contained an explicit obligation on the Secretary of State to “comply” with the strategy. The absence of that word may not mean anything significant, but perhaps that could be clarified.

The Bill will turn the Highways Agency into a wholly owned Government company. We support road investment strategies to give the roads sector the same funding certainty as the railways, to enable efficiency savings to be delivered in the supply chain and to improve infrastructure planning. Most reviews of the Highways Agency—most recently the Cook review of 2011—have shown that the ending of stop-start Government funding could cut costs on the strategic road network, construction maintenance and management by 15% to 20%. We support that, but we will continue to ask the Government why we need a top-down reorganisation of the Highways Agency to deliver that strategy.

We have still not had the evidence for that. The only real evidence I have seen is an EC Harris paper in 2009, which found that motorway construction costs were higher per lane kilometre in the UK than in Holland, where the road operator is at arm’s length. If we look closely, however, we see that the additional costs in the UK were from CCTV, speed enforcement and vehicle recovery services, which are funded separately under the Dutch model. The additional costs also come from higher technical standards for pavements and structures, more complex ground conditions, design solutions and drainage provisions. Therefore, there is not the evidence to say that the Government need to have that top-down reorganisation. We are not convinced. We have debated this and scrutinised it in two Houses of Parliament, but there is no substantial evidence to prove that an institutional reorganisation, with estimated transitional costs of £100 million, is needed. That is why we will be moving to delete the clauses from the Bill today, while maintaining a commitment to the road investment strategy.

The Minister touched on accountability. I welcome the changes and amendments he has made. There are still some pretty fundamental questions, however, about primary accountability and responsibility. We cannot allow the Secretary of State to become a third party commentator on the performance of a company and the state of the road network: he must be answerable for it. The Minister has said that he completely signs up to that and I believe that that is his intention, but if so why are we having to debate a structure that separates responsibility for the road network from ministerial responsibility? In the absence of any real evidence to prove that this is needed, is it any surprise that many people are worried that this could become—not now, but in the future—a way of creating an increasingly contracted out, carved out and removed from public control structure? That is causing concern from organisations as diverse as the Public and Commercial Services Union, Prospect and the Alliance of British Drivers, right the way through to members of the British Chambers of Commerce. Our amendment would keep the oversight mechanisms of a monitor and road user watchdog in place, even if we did not go ahead with the reform of the Highways Agency.

The Minister talked about route strategies. He was right to do so, as they have been a major part of the discussion in Committee and elsewhere. Our concern is that, while reform and investment in the strategic highway network is absolutely necessary, we have to remember that the changes and the whole Bill affect just 2% of roads. The Department for Transport’s own research shows that 90% of the public are satisfied with those roads. That is not to say that there should be any complacency, but it does not affect the 98% of local roads that people rely on every day. It is here that we see the pothole epidemic, and it is here that we see record public dissatisfaction and congestion levels estimated to rise by 61% by 2040, so it is crucial that strategic road plans support city, county and regional growth plans and help councils to improve road conditions and to tackle congestion. Strategic roads must be co-planned with local networks and other transport modes so that we can really improve people’s everyday journeys and reduce traffic congestion.

I am pleased that pressure from Labour and transport campaigners has secured a greater priority for local roads and joined-up transport thinking in the Bill, and I thank the Minister for the movements he has made, but we need to go further. We need to get our entire transport system working as a connected whole. That is why we want Network Rail and the new company to sit down and map and plan road and rail routes together, and not only to take reasonable account of each other’s views. We want to ensure that local authorities and devolved bodies are represented at board level in the company, too. There are long-running difficulties in joining up local and strategic roads to get the network moving as one. We do not agree that “considering” local views and allowing local authorities to align their plans with a company is enough.

For that reason, our amendment 43 sets out some safeguards to ensure that the road investment strategy is a genuine co-product of plans with other transport networks, devolved growth plans and local transport provision, including walking and cycling, and to ensure that the road investment strategy is developed in consideration of the condition of local roads, a third of which, we know, are in urgent need of attention. Under the Government’s plans, £1.4 million per mile will be spent on the maintenance of strategic roads, but only £31,700 per mile is allocated to local roads. I hope that hon. Members will seriously consider the safeguards that we have argued for and which have been supported by the Local Government Association and others today.

Throughout this debate, it has been clear that infrastructure must be planned to meet clear economic, social and environmental objectives, but we have seen from previous debates on energy and planning that the Bill has often fallen far short of doing that. Along with groups such as the Campaign for Better Transport and the Campaign to Protect Rural England, therefore, we have pressed for obligations to ensure that strategic roads investment improves our environment. That means action to meet legally binding climate change targets by 2050. Worryingly, the Department’s forecast predicts that although road traffic emissions will flatten they will then start to increase in the 2030s. We need urgent action, therefore, to tackle air pollution, which is estimated to be killing up to 29,000 people prematurely each year, and vehicle emissions, such as particulate matter and oxides of nitrogen, which are major sources of the problem.

The road investment strategy states that the new company should make progress towards reducing the negative impacts on air quality, but in the light of the Government’s record on air quality that is not very reassuring—a point to which my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent North (Joan Walley) alluded earlier. The UK is not compliant with EU limits on air pollution now. In November, the European Court of Justice said that urgent action was needed, but under this Government’s plan we will not be compliant until 2030, and that simply is not good enough. That is why we are asking for much greater action than is in the Bill; why we have committed to a national framework of low-emission zones to help local authorities tackle the problem; and why we are pleased to support amendment 70, which my hon. Friend tabled, and which would add an explicit obligation on the new company to address air quality issues.

I wish to say a word about transfers—I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) will want to say something about this as well. I welcome the Minister’s assurances in Committee that the terms and conditions of employees transferring will not diminish—I believe he meant it, and it was good he met the trade unions—but, as my hon. Friend said, one issue remains: if the TUPE regulations, or the mechanisms used to apply them in other reorganisations, are to apply, why has that not been enshrined in the Bill? As the Bill continues its passage, I hope that those issues will be addressed further, and I welcome the Minister’s clarification today that he will come back to us on the question of constructive dismissal, on which the Bill does not currently make sense.

The road reforms could have done so much more to fix Britain’s roads. A constituent of mine wrote to me last week:

“I have major concerns about the ill thought out proposals which will do nothing to assist the UK economically and will be of great concern to road users.”

I think a lot of people would agree with that. We need to ensure that infrastructure decisions are based on national independent evidence-based assessments, which could be done if we set up the national infrastructure commission; we need to facilitate more efficient joint road and rail planning, which could have been done had our amendments been accepted; and we need to join up local and strategic roads to get the whole network moving. Unfortunately, the Bill is a wasted opportunity. Its centrepiece, before all the others things were added, was another top-down reorganisation that cannot deliver the changes our road network needs.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—

--- Later in debate ---

[Richard Burden]

Toward the end of his remarks, the Minister praised members of the Bill Committee and adopted a consensual approach, so perhaps I shall start in the same vein. I, too, thank all those who have contributed to debate on the Bill as it has gone through its various stages. In particular, I add my thanks to Labour’s team in the other place for the improvements they sought, and in some cases secured, and to my hon. Friends the Members for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Tom Greatrex) and for City of Durham (Roberta Blackman-Woods), with whom I led for the Opposition in Committee and again today.

I also thank all members of the Committee on both sides who scrutinised the Bill, but two in particular: my right hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr Raynsford) and my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Andrew Miller). For both, this will have been their last Bill Committee, I suspect, unless they do something dreadfully wrong in the next few weeks. Both have given great service to the House. In fact, when we were both new in this place, the first Bill Committee I served on was also my hon. Friend’s first Bill Committee, so it is great that we have shared his last.

Finally, I thank the Minister and his colleagues, and all those who have contributed to today’s debate. We all know that infrastructure is critical to the UK’s future, from affordable energy in our homes to a modern communications system, or a transport system connecting people to jobs, opportunities and each other. Good infrastructure is vital to our economy and our quality of life. That is why it was so important to give the Bill the thorough scrutiny that it deserved. Given its wide-ranging nature, it should have had more than one day for Report and Third Reading; the way debates today have been truncated underlines that fact.

It is of course even more wide-ranging than what the Library briefing described as a “portmanteau Bill”, when it was introduced in this place. The Bill has had a new long title, and it has two more parts and many more clauses than when it was introduced. It ranges from the abolition of the somewhat mysterious Public Works Loan Board commissioners to invasive non-native species to the British Transport police, and everything in between.

Constructive criticism has strengthened the Bill, ensuring that a rushed and badly drafted reform of the electronic communications code governing mobile telephone infrastructure will be rethought. We have new requirements to support apprenticeships and training in road construction, and we have a walking and cycling strategy which is welcome and must be built on. Important actions that will follow from the Bill include the Wood review, whose implementation will be vital. If we needed reminding of that, the current situation in the North sea is such a reminder. In a victory for wildlife groups, communities in Devon and Scotland and the Opposition, we have protected the European beaver.

For making some of those changes and changes in other areas, including some of the roads clauses, I pay tribute to the Minister for the way that he has approached these matters. We still disagree on some key points, particularly on converting the Highways Agency into a Government-owned company, but he understands the need for scrutiny of Bills and he has made changes to the Bill in response to issues that we and others have raised. That shows how legislation can be approached. Sadly, that is the part of proceedings in this place that the public all too seldom see.

However, as we approached today’s debate, some things went badly wrong, starting with the timetable and the fact that we had only one day on Report. We have seen far too many last-minute changes to the Bill and things being tagged on without time for parliamentary scrutiny, despite the Minister’s best efforts. We saw it in the rushed electronic communications code, which ended up pleasing nobody and had to be rethought. It was not in the Bill in the other place; it came in more than halfway through the Committee stage and had to be withdrawn today. It was not necessary for that to happen. The issue should have been approached in a more measured way.

In relation to new regulations regarding planning and pubs, we tabled a thought-through amendment, but the response was a last-minute rushed statement to try to head off that amendment, instead of Ministers looking at what was being said, responding to that and enshrining it in the Bill. Most notable today has been the issue of shale gas extraction. I am pleased that the Government accepted our new clause 19, which introduces 13 conditions as vital protection if shale gas extraction is to be taken forward. The matter should not have had to be resolved today at the last minute with the Government finally accepting an Opposition amendment, presumably because they thought they would lose unless they did so. These issues have been raised in Committee and elsewhere, and they could have been resolved elsewhere. My hon. Friend the Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West has been raising them for three years. We now know that new clause 19 has been accepted and I welcome that.

I have to say to the Government that one or two comments made today suggested that although new clause 19 was being accepted today, when the Bill went back to the other place, there could be attempts to tinker with it—take a bit out here, put a bit in there. If the Government go down that road, they will be asking for trouble. That new clause was thought through. It is a package, not a pick and mix. I hope the Government will respect that as we go forward.

As the Opposition have continued to state throughout proceedings on the Bill, we face major infrastructure challenges—a population rising to 73 million in just 20 years’ time, the challenges of energy security, a chronic shortage of affordable housing, airports, roads and railways all straining under demand, and the threat that climate change presents to us all. There is a cross-party consensus on the need to address these issues, but all too often decisions are not taken, public support is not achieved and projects are not delivered.

We may be one of the world’s leading economies but we lag behind other countries that take a more strategic and long-term approach to infrastructure investment. As the noble Lord Adonis said last week, infrastructure investment

“will not happen on the scale required unless it is better planned, better led and better financed.”—[Official Report, House of Lords, 22 January 2015; Vol. 758, c. 1392.]

During the Committee stage, the Institute of Government published a booklet called “The Political Economy of Infrastructure in the UK”, which concluded that we need to change the “institutional architecture” for infrastructure decision making. Labour Members completely agree. That is why my hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham called for this House to back the proposal by Sir John Armitt, chair of the Olympic Delivery Authority, for a national infrastructure commission that would look three decades ahead and consult across all sectors to provide an evidence-based assessment of infrastructure priorities in the UK. Parliament would be able to vote on these, and Governments would be held accountable for delivering them.

For me, the debates on this Bill have crystallised why that kind of evidence-based approach is needed so badly, from controversy about the priorities in the road investment strategy, to disputes about rushed electronic communications regulations, to the need for robust environmental and regulatory safeguards in relation to energy security. We need a more rigorous and independent look at infrastructure needs in energy, transport, telecoms and many other sectors. It is a travesty that the Government continue to oppose such a common-sense reform, which is backed by the LSE Growth Commission, EEF, the Institution of Civil Engineers, 89% of businesses surveyed by the CBI, and many more. By establishing that commission, the Bill could have set the UK on course for the challenges of the 21st century, but it has failed to do so. The repeated failure of the Government to address these issues in a sufficiently planned-out way is not good enough.

This could all have been very different. With a shared national purpose, long-term planning, proper public engagement and cross-party support for our world-leading engineering and construction sectors, we can deliver the improvements our country’s infrastructure needs. The 2012 Olympics were a model of that kind of approach. We urgently need the same framework for decision making and planning across national infrastructure. This Bill could have delivered that, but it has not done so, and we have a Government who are not going to do so. That is why it will take a change of Government in May to deliver the change that is needed.

Infrastructure Bill [Lords]

Richard Burden Excerpts

Monday 26th January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

Mr Speaker, I completely endorse your point about the Minister being an extraordinary specimen of humanity, which we commented on in Committee on many occasions.

I will not detain the House long, but may I say a few words? I welcome what the Minister said about the Committee stage, which was conducted maturely. There are still differences that we will debate today—fairly sharp ones in many cases—but there was movement, and I welcome the Minister’s approach in Committee on such areas. However, he is right to say that we asked for two days on Report. That should not have been too much to ask for a Bill that was introduced in the other place, and to which whole new areas were added when it reached this place, to the extent that even the long title had to be changed in Committee. That is not a good way to approach legislation. Against that background, it should not have been too much to have two days for proper scrutiny on Report and Third Reading; sadly, we have been denied that opportunity.

The problem with debating programme motions is that there is always this dilemma for the House and for the Opposition: do we debate the fact that we have not got enough time to talk about the Bill, or do we get on with talking about it in the time available? I will not detain the House by dividing on the programme motion, but for the benefit of all Members I want it to be recorded that the Bill was introduced and pursued in a cack-handed way, and that it should receive greater scrutiny today than the time available allows.

Oral Answers to Questions

Richard Burden Excerpts

Thursday 22nd January 2015 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hayes]

I wondered whether my hon. Friend might ask this question, because he has raised the subject in an Adjournment debate and I know that he is a great champion of his constituents’ interests. I thought, as you must have done, Mr Speaker, of Ezra Pound, who said:

“What matters is not the idea a man holds, but the depth at which he holds it”.

Any man who advocates tunnelling at this scale certainly holds an idea at very great depth indeed. This is a matter for local councils—for Lancashire and Cumbria—and it is for them to consult their local enterprise partnerships. Nevertheless, I am interested in the scheme and am happy to invite my hon. Friend to the Department to discuss it with officials and see what can be done.

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

I do not know whether the Minister has a prepared answer for this one, but may I take him back just a few weeks to the launch of a poster showing a road smoothly stretching out into the distance which was discovered to be a German road full of potholes that had been airbrushed out? Is that why he and other Ministers are trying to airbrush out the fact that spending for local road maintenance will be lower in real terms in 2020 than it was in 2010?

Infrastructure Bill [Lords]

Richard Burden Excerpts

Monday 8th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for those few brief words of introduction to the Bill, and I look forward to debating its contents with him. If he will forgive me, I will not quote Disraeli quite so extensively as he did. I might not even quote “Alice in Wonderland” quite so extensively, although he might like to think about his own party’s performance as I remind him of another quote from the book, in which a character says that when he uses a word,

“it means just what I choose it to mean”.

That seems to typify the Government’s flip-flopping on infrastructure up to now.

The Minister has had criticism for Opposition Members today. Interestingly, he has also had some veiled criticism for his predecessors from those on the Government Benches, which surprised many of us. Perhaps that shows that infrastructure policy was not really in shape until he came along. Also, I could not help but notice that he kept referring to “my Department”. The Secretary of State for Transport, who is sitting alongside him, might need to be a bit careful about who is after his job.

This is a complex and wide-ranging Bill. It contains extensive provisions covering a whole range of Departments, which is why I am pleased to be joined on the Opposition Front Bench today by the shadow Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley East (Michael Dugher), as well as by my hon. Friends the Members for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Tom Greatrex) and for City of Durham (Roberta Blackman-Woods). The Library briefing on the Bill describes it as a “portmanteau” Bill, and we are pleased to welcome the Minister and his portmanteau to the House today.

The Bill comes nowhere near to meeting the challenges faced by transport, energy and housing, despite all that the Minister has said today. There is cross-party consensus on the importance of infrastructure to our economy. Economic and population growth and the need to decarbonise our economy will all add further strain to an infrastructure that is already creaking. There seem to be different views about that. I imagine that, while we might disagree on a number of aspects of the Bill, hon. Members on both sides of the House will have raised an eyebrow on hearing the leader of UKIP explaining that the problems with infrastructure were all down to immigration, but I guess that that is a matter for him.

The Minister said that the Bill proved the Government’s commitment to investing in infrastructure. We have heard a lot of talk from the Government on infrastructure over the past week or so. We have heard the re-announcement of a £15 billion road programme—two thirds of which, surprisingly, has been earmarked for coalition Members’ constituencies—yet this is happening after the Government scrapped £4 billion-worth of strategic roads investment on entering office. We have also heard another garden city announcement, yet Ministers have presided over the lowest peacetime level of house building since the 1920s. And we have had yet another infrastructure plan update, promising yet more schemes, when the reality is that less that a fifth of the projects are in construction and infrastructure output is down more than 10% since 2010.

Let me give the House an example of one of the supposed achievements of the plan that the Government have published. The Dartford crossing is a major bottleneck, with serious congestion. One of the achievements of the Government’s infrastructure plan is—wait for it!—to narrow down three options for improving one of the worst traffic bottlenecks in the country to two.

[Jackie Doyle-Price (Thurrock) (Con)]

Since the hon. Gentleman is critical of this Government for narrowing down the options to two, will he advise the House which option he would choose?

[Richard Burden]

I have a feeling that in this debate Conservative hon. Member after Conservative hon. Member will stand up and ask me about this scheme or that scheme, and will say, “Come on. Will Labour go ahead with this or not?” We are not in the business of cutting long-term investment in our roads infrastructure in the way that the present Government cut long-term investment in infrastructure. But if we are looking through individual scheme after individual scheme, we are going to scrutinise them. We are going to see if they are all they are cracked up to be.

Let me give other examples. In many cases the Government’s figures do not add up. In some announcements there is £3.5 billion-worth of investment for 20 new schemes; in other announcements, that becomes £3.4 billion. In 2013 we read that £8.5 billion had been set aside for 26 schemes; that now appears to be £6 billion. In some announcements there has been £15.1 billion for 2015 to 2021, but in answer to a parliamentary question that I asked the Minister last week, the figure was £15.2 billion, and it is still unclear whether this is entirely Government money or whether the Department for Transport is still waiting for third-party contributions to make up the total. I shall not be able to give answers on individual schemes because as far as I can tell, those individual schemes do not add up, but we will scrutinise them. We will ask the difficult questions, because those are the questions that the public expect us to ask.

[Mr Redwood]

Now that the shadow Minister has seen the projected overall levels of capital expenditure laid out by the coalition Government in the autumn statement for the period up to 2020, does his party think they are the right levels, or are they too low or too high?

[Richard Burden]

As I said in answer to the previous question, we are not in the business of saying that we wish to cut back on capital investment. For goodness’ sake, we have been saying for four years that the Government have not been investing enough in infrastructure. It seemed from the Minister’s opening remarks that he was criticising the previous Government for not having spent enough. That is a bit of a change from what we have heard before—usually we are accused of having spent too much. Labour spent a total of £93.7 billion on our road network between 1997 and 2010. That is because we are interested and we are committed to repairing our creaking infrastructure. That will not change.

[David Morris (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Con)]

It is nice to hear how much Labour spent on roads, but does the hon. Gentleman agree that it took 60 years to get a bypass in my constituency, and for 13 of those years under Labour rule the scheme was knocked back and confused? It took me to get £123 million from this Government to build the road. It has been built.

[Richard Burden]

I am sure the hon. Gentleman has been a great advocate for his constituency, as are hon. Members across the House. That does not alter the fact that, as I said, I want to check that these Government announcements are all they are cracked up to be. Even a few examples indicate to me that there are a lot more questions to ask.

Investment in infrastructure needs to be long term. That is key, and that is why Labour is backing the proposal by Sir John Armitt, the man who delivered the Olympics—in practice, not just in theory—for a national infrastructure commission. That looks not just five years ahead, but 20 or 30 years ahead to produce an evidence-based assessment of national infrastructure needs. That should establish a cross-party consensus on priorities, breaking electoral cycles and ending the stop-start announcements we have seen up until now. It can also hold the Government to account for delivery. That would help the Government and it would help Parliament’s decision making. That is why it is backed by more than 89% of businesses surveyed by the CBI. For all that the Minister said about wanting to build a consensus on these things, words have, again, not been matched by actions. The Government had the chance in the other place to accept the idea of a national infrastructure commission, a cross-party body to plan infrastructure for the long term, and what did they do? They voted down such an amendment, and that commission is nowhere in the Bill today.

Let me now deal with some specific parts of the Bill. On highways and transportation, Labour supports long-term roads funding and we want to end stop-start funding. We want to give the supply chain the confidence to invest in skills and equipment, and enable the Highways Agency to negotiate better contracts and make efficiency savings. We want to see those contracts create new apprenticeships to train young engineers, as Britain will need 780,000 to meet demand by 2020. I am very pleased that the Minister has mentioned these matters in his opening remarks, and I am sure that if the Bill gets to Committee we will press him further on them.

There are three problems to discuss. First, Ministers have failed to prove why a top-down institutional reorganisation of the Highways Agency is needed to deliver long-term roads funding. After extensive debate on the rationale for this in the other place, the fact is—this came across clearly there—that the Highways Agency can deliver a five-year roads programme without being turned into a wholly owned Government company. The Alan Cook review showed that it can make £1.2 billion-worth of efficiency savings. That can be delivered through funding certainty, not because it should be a wholly owned Government company or because of institutional change. The cross-party Transport Select Committee has concluded that it is “not convinced” by the need for a new company. It is the roads investment strategy that will enable an efficient and faster delivery of roads, not necessarily an arm’s length body, and we will be looking for clear evidence from the Government of why this move is needed. I do not mean anecdotal evidence or what Benjamin Disraeli might have predicted; we need facts on why this is going to be needed to deliver long-term investment, as all we have seen to date is conjecture and confusion.

The Bill previously included clauses to set up more than one highways company. Fortunately, Ministers have rowed back from that, but the model is still confused. The body is to have a licence but officials recognise that it cannot have a “licence to operate” as it has no income stream or revenue-raising powers. With such a shaky rationale, is it any wonder that the Government proposal to set up a wholly owned Government company has met widespread concern from organisations ranging right the way from the Alliance of British Drivers to unions like the Public and Commercial Services Union and Prospect, who see this as a precursor to privatising an asset worth £111 billion?

[Caroline Lucas]

I am confused by Labour’s great love of yet more road building. We had a welcome article from Ed Miliband yesterday in which he talked about the importance of climate change. Some 25% of—

[Caroline Lucas]

I do apologise, Madam Deputy Speaker. The right nomenclature momentarily went from my mind, but I am very happy to refer to the Leader of the Opposition—the honourable Leader of the Opposition. [Hon. Members: “Right honourable.”] The right hon. Leader of the Opposition. The point is that what he wrote about climate change is not in harmony with what we are hearing now, which is the Labour party saying that we need more roads. Roads are responsible for more and more CO₂ emissions, which cause climate change.

[Richard Burden]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right on this point: protecting our planet and our environment has to be centre stage for any serious Government at the moment. It is also absolutely right that in a whole range of areas we need to look for the most effective and environmentally sensitive forms of transport. Does one conclude therefore that all road building is wrong and that congestion does not need to be tackled? No, because all those things must be done as well, but they must be done sensitively and in harmony with our environment. That was said by the Opposition in the other place, and we will be exploring all those areas if this Bill gets as far as Committee stage.

[Ian Lucas]

Does my hon. Friend think it would be helpful for the hon. Member for Brighton, Pavilion (Caroline Lucas) to attend a meeting of the all-party motor group and to arrange a visit to Nissan in Sunderland to see the Nissan Leaf, an electric, non-petroleum-driven motor car, to see the innovation being taken forward by the motor industry on a real green agenda?

[Richard Burden]

My hon. Friend is right on that point. As well as being a shadow Minister with responsibility for roads, I have the honour of chairing the all-party motor group. Fortunately, the days of seeing the motor vehicle as an inevitable enemy of environmental protection are long gone. There is a great deal of innovation going on in the automotive industry. Although the hon. Lady has some very serious points to make, she should understand who brought in the Climate Change Act 2008, and who was Energy Secretary when some of the best initiatives on preserving the environment were taken in Britain. That should give her a little more confidence that the Opposition take our environmental responsibilities seriously.

Another area that the Bill does not tackle is that of local roads. The Minister talks about a roads revolution, but in reality this Bill addresses just 2% of the road network, as 98% of the roads in this country are local roads. Two-thirds of traffic is on local roads. Motorists, pedestrians, cyclists, HGV drivers and motorcyclists all rely on roads to get around. Nearly all our journeys start and finish on local roads, but it is those roads that are the most creaking part of our road infrastructure. A third of local roads are in urgent need of attention. There is a £12 billion pothole backlog that will take 12 years to fix, and congestion on local roads is set to rise by 61% by 2040. A record 91% of the public are dissatisfied with the condition of local roads. Nearly 90% of businesses surveyed by the CBI expect local roads to get worse, not better. That is not surprising, because spending on local road maintenance is down 11% since 2010. Under this Government, it will decline further in real terms by 2020. There is a risk that the Bill will make the situation worse.

Local government and transport campaigners have warned that giving strategic roads management to an arm’s length company could create a two-tier road system, pushing traffic on to local roads and into our towns and cities. We need proper joined-up planning between strategic and local road networks, with devolved bodies and local authorities having greater powers over local transport and traffic management to tackle congestion. That is why we on the Opposition Benches are committed to English devolution. City regions face huge congestion pressure between now and 2040. They are planning their 20-year growth strategies, and need confidence that the Highways Agency, or whatever it is called, is working to similar horizons. We need an independent commission to take that long-term view.

Ring-fencing money for environmental protection, innovation, cycling and safety is important, which is why I am pleased that there is a £100 million budget for cycling on strategic roads. The problem is that it is yet another one-off announcement. It is not the long-term commitment to funding to get Britain cycling. As far as I can tell, the Department for Transport still has no clear budget for cycling, and funding is set to end by 2016 when the local sustainable transport fund finishes. It seems ludicrous that we will have five years of that.

After two years of calling for safety targets to be reinstated, I am pleased that the Government have finally recognised that axing them was a mistake. It is good to see in the road investment strategy a target to cut deaths and serious injuries by 40% on strategic roads by 2020. However, if it is right to have road safety targets for the strategic road network, why cannot we have safety commitments and targets for all UK roads?

It seems ludicrous that we will have five years of road and rail plans that will not be joined up. One of the most pressing transport problems is that, too often, decisions on road, rail and airports are taken in individual silos. Investments are not joined up and maximised. The Government’s proposals to study the options for HS3 include a tunnel under the Peak district and other trans-Pennine road improvements, but they are being considered separately when they should be looked at together. Where is the requirement for the new company and Network Rail to share forecasts, and to map and plan investment in a co-ordinated way?

[Mr Hayes]

I agree with both the hon. Gentleman’s last two points on integration and road safety more generally. If he brings proposals to the Committee, I will consider them both very carefully.

[Richard Burden]

I am grateful to the Minister. I am sure we can pursue and discuss the matter in Committee if the Bill gets that far.

My final point—perhaps the Minister has reassuring words on this—is whether the new agency will have adequate accountability, which the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) mentioned. Passenger Focus will be renamed Transport Focus because it will have a responsibility for roads as well as for rail and bus. Why is there still a silo mentality on the Office of the Rail Regulator, even though it will have a monitoring role? After pressure from the Opposition in the other place to give the new body more powers, it cannot be a regulator of roads. In the Bill, Transport Focus can represent only people who use strategic roads—it will not represent pedestrians or cyclists who use local roads, or motorists who are frustrated with conditions on local roads. I hope we can look at that if the Bill gets as far as Committee. With the recent ruling on the UK’s air quality infraction, should not a watchdog consider the environmental impact of any new company?

What about the Minister’s accountability to Parliament? Will hon. Members be able to table parliamentary questions and have proper debates on roads, whether in the Chamber or in Westminster Hall, or will we get letters from the chief executive of the new body instead? The chief executive of the Highways Agency has said that the reform will enable it to “set its own destiny”. The public depend on roads for daily life, so is that what we want? We will want to look at that closely in Committee if the Bill gets that far, and I hope the Minister reflects on it.

The Opposition support the extension of powers for the British Transport police to obtain driver information and take enforcement action outside the railways. That proposal was tabled by Lord Faulkner in the other place, with the Opposition’s support. It is an absurd situation when trained and effective British Transport police officers have to ask permission to take enforcement action on land outside railway jurisdiction. That makes no sense to the public. I hope the Minister will comment, today or later, on how that relates to the Smith commission recommendation that the British Transport police should be devolved.

The Opposition support a proper control regime for invasive non-native species, but we do not believe the Bill is fit for purpose. After the badger cull chaos, the Government listened to pressure from animal rights campaigners, wildlife groups, the National Farmers Union and Labour, and it is good that they included animal welfare protections in the regime. However, although there are three distinct categories of species in the Bill—native, former native and non-native—the definitions still seem problematic. We expect the Government to look at the EU habitats directive for those definitions, and will seek assurances that specific species such as the beaver will be given legal protection.

The Bill also includes a number of changes to the planning regime, none of which seem to go anywhere near addressing the housing crisis facing Britain today. Effective and efficient planning is vital, and we will support sensible changes to deliver a timely planning system, especially for nationally significant infrastructure projects. We want the Bill to define what the public can expect from garden cities in terms of high-quality design and sustainability for strong and inclusive communities for the future. My hon. Friend the Member for City of Durham will expand on that point later, say why the Bill fails to ensure that building standards reduce CO₂ sufficiently, and explain our position on deemed discharge, land transfers to the Homes and Communities Agency, and the Land Registry. Suffice it to say that a trend seems to be emerging with the Government’s Land Registry reforms, which still seem rather confused, and they appear to have made a U-turn on putting those at arm’s length. Perhaps the most glaring omission on housing and land use is the fact that the Bill contains no acknowledgment of the housing crisis our country faces, of what the Lyons review said, or that Labour is right to call for ambitious reforms and 200,000 extra homes to be built a year. This Bill is a far cry from that.

Part 5 sets out a number of provisions on energy. Getting energy policy right is critical to our economy and vital to enable all infrastructure sectors to function. It is therefore a shame that the Bill contains no ambitious commitment or strategy to ensure that the UK will meet growing demand in a sustainable way. The Bill sets out a new community right for a stake in renewable energy schemes—that is fine, although we do not think it goes far enough—and it is good that it implements Wood review proposals for increasing oil and gas extraction, which have cross-party support. However, the issue that I am sure generates the most interest, both inside and outside the House, is in clauses 38 to 43 on underground access to shale and geothermal energy—there have already been questions on that.

[Helen Jones]

Is my hon. Friend aware that in constituencies such as mine people are concerned not only that there are no adequate safeguards in the Bill, but that even the Government’s minor concessions, such as the requirement on companies to notify people of their right to land use and of the payments that can be made, will be reviewed after five years? Does that indicate that the Government are not serious about putting sufficient statutory protections in place?

[Richard Burden]

My hon. Friend makes an important point that was repeated in the other place and if the Bill gets to Committee, and we will be seeking a much more robust regulatory environment. My hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Andrew Miller) said that securing public confidence is not just important to us as parliamentarians when representing our constituents, but it is also important to the industry, which needs public concern about this issue like a hole in the head. If questions are to be answered they should be answered, and we should have transparency and a proper regulatory regime.

[Barbara Keeley]

The planning process for shale gas was changed on the first day of the recess last year—a day after we had debated it here—and there was no chance to comment. As my hon. Friend says, it is important that the public have confidence, which they cannot have at the moment. Planning authorities such as that in Salford should not have been denied the chance to comment on and take into account certain measures that were removed by the Government last year, and the time scale should not have been shortened. People need time to get their heads around this complex process, and planning authorities have fewer staff than they once had. I mentioned the payment scheme, which is totally unsatisfactory. People whose businesses lost money or who could not sell their homes will not be compensated by giving small amounts of money to the scout group down the road. This must be dealt with—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Order. I call the Minister.

[Richard Burden]

rose—

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I beg your pardon. I mean Richard Burden.

[Richard Burden]

I am grateful Madam Deputy Speaker. Let us give it another five months.

It is difficult on Second Reading to go through the specifics of what is needed, but my hon. Friend has mentioned some important issues. There is a whole range of areas where we can tighten regulation. To give the Government some credit, they have so far accepted a number of our proposals—we put forward six—which is good, but there are still areas where they need to sharpen up. She mentioned timing. Our view is that, where there is monitoring, there is no reason why it should not take place over a proper 12-month period.

[Andrew Miller]

The Minister ignored what happened in the other place, although I understood it to be part of the constitutional process. My hon. Friend will know that one of the amendments was about baseline monitoring. It seems to me that we cannot have a proper, scientific assessment of any process without proper baseline monitoring. Will he give a firm commitment that Labour will press that point to the nth degree in Committee if we get that far?

[Richard Burden]

My hon. Friend is absolutely spot on and the answer is yes.

[Jonathan Edwards]

As I said earlier, over the weekend the Labour Government in Wales said that they wanted powers over licensing to be devolved to Wales. Will the official Opposition table amendments in Committee to support the position of the Labour party in Wales?

[Richard Burden]

The important thing in relation to these provisions is that regulation is robust and effective and that it happens at the most effective and correct level. We know that the Smith commission has made some specific suggestions, which we will be considering, and there are other issues that we can talk about. The important thing is that it works. My hon. Friend the Member for Wrexham (Ian Lucas) was absolutely right to say that what the public want to know is whether it will work.

[Ian Lucas]

I think that a pragmatic approach is the correct one. My personal opinion, on the point the hon. Member for Carmarthen East and Dinefwr (Jonathan Edwards) raised, is that it makes sense for this to be devolved, since so much of the planning regime in Wales is devolved.

[Richard Burden]

My hon. Friend is right that the most effective place for planning needs to be the place where these regulations operate.

[Mr Mike Weir (Angus) (SNP)]

I am listening carefully to the hon. Gentleman. I understand what he says about tighter regulation, which is welcome. However, the Smith commission has recommended devolution of these powers to Scotland. Planning already rests with the Scottish Government, whose attitude has perhaps been different from that of planners south of the border. Would it not make sense, before fracking is fully established, for all the powers to rest in the same place so that this can be looked at properly?

[Richard Burden]

I must say that I am a little confused by the hon. Gentleman’s point. As I understand it, the current situation, even without this Bill, is that shale gas extraction can happen in Scotland only with the approval of the Government in Holyrood. I also understand—perhaps he will correct me if I am wrong—that the Scottish Government, despite having an effective veto over any development in Scotland, actually voted against a shale gas moratorium earlier this year. He is right that the Smith commission has recommended the devolution of mineral access rights and the licensing process to Scotland. If this goes as far as Committee, I am sure that the issue will be explored there.

Labour is committed to the decarbonisation of the power sector by 2030 and to reducing our carbon emissions in line with the Climate Change Act 2008.

[Mr Hayes]

Before the hon. Gentleman moves on from shale gas, and leaving aside the issue of where power is exercised and how close that is to its effects, let me repeat that we recognise that this is an embryonic industry. We are very happy, during the course of the Bill’s consideration, to listen to reasonable overtures about safety and other matters such as those that have been raised in this House.

[Richard Burden]

I am grateful for the Minister’s comments.

As the Committee on Climate Change has said, within our legally binding carbon targets, gas can have a role to play as part of a balanced energy mix, along with renewables, nuclear, and carbon capture and storage. With 80% of our homes reliant on gas for heating, and in the context of declining North sea oil production, indigenous shale gas production may have a beneficial impact on our energy security. However, only by fully addressing legitimate environmental and safety concerns about fracking, with the kind of robust regulation that I have been talking about, with comprehensive monitoring and strict enforcement, will we give people confidence that the exploration and possible extraction of shale gas is safe and a reliable source that can contribute to the UK’s energy mix. That is why we are seeking to amend the Bill in Committee to ensure that any fracking could happen only under robust safety and environmental standards.

The issue of underground access rights is separate from the environmental and safety framework. It does not affect the requirement for consent to be sought for exploration and extraction through planning and relevant environmental permitting processes. Any application sanctioned by local authorities will require a strict environmental assessment. Other industries requiring underground access—such as coal mining, water, sewerage, and gas transportation pipelines—already have underground access rights without requiring the landowner’s permission. In principle, we do not oppose the reforms to underground access. However, we will continue to push for the environmental framework to be strengthened, and for assurances that the responsibility for clean-up costs and the liability for any untoward consequences rest fairly and squarely with the industry, not with taxpayers or homeowners.

Important regulatory questions must be answered before large-scale extraction can begin, but Conservative Ministers have so far chosen to ignore those legitimate environmental concerns rather than address them and provide safeguards for communities. That is why we will table amendments to close a number of loopholes in the existing regulatory framework. My hon. Friend the Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West will set those out in detail in Committee. We are taking a responsible approach. People will have confidence that shale gas is a safe and reliable source only if this Government provide robust regulations, set out a comprehensive monitoring process, and ensure strict enforcement of exploration and extraction. Sadly, we heard no such assurances from the Minister.

The Bill has some important provisions to help to facilitate and improve national infrastructure planning, but too many parts are weak or confused. Above all, it is no match for the infrastructure challenges that face the UK in transport, in housing, and in energy. That is why Labour wants an independent commission to set out the priorities and strategy that we need to deliver—not just announce, re-announce, and re-announce again—the infrastructure that the UK so urgently needs.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Mrs Eleanor Laing)]

Am I to take it that the hon. Gentleman is moving amendment (b)?

[Richard Burden]

My mistake, Madam Deputy Speaker. I can let you into a secret: I received a note from my colleagues saying, “Don’t forget to move the amendment”, and I did precisely that.

I beg to move an amendment, to leave out from “That” to the end of the Question and add:

“this House declines to give a second reading to the Infrastructure Bill because, whilst welcoming efforts to further enable necessary infrastructure projects and acknowledging that long-term strategic planning and investment for transport infrastructure is urgently needed, the Bill fails to establish an independent National Infrastructure Commission to set out an evidence-based analysis of future infrastructure priorities in sectors including transport, waste and energy, and to hold governments accountable for delivery, because the Bill creates a new Strategic Highways Company, which could result in an increasingly two-tiered road system when there is no evidence that a new company is needed to deliver a road investment strategy, because the Bill fails to address the deteriorating condition of the local road network due to the cuts in spending since 2010 on local road maintenance, because the Bill does not ensure that unconventional gas extraction could only happen in the context of robust safety and environmental standards, comprehensive monitoring and strict enforcement, because the Bill fails to give communities new powers so that they can build the homes they need locally in the places they want, and because the Bill fails to include Garden City principles to underpin the next generation of New Towns, fails to strike the right balance between communities and developers in the discharge of planning conditions, and fails to properly plan ahead to ensure that building standards address CO2 emissions and climate change.”

[Madam Deputy Speaker]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his belated but sincere moving of the amendment. I call Professor Charles Hendry.

Oral Answers to Questions

Richard Burden Excerpts

Thursday 4th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hayes]

This is not the first time that my right hon. Friend has raised this matter. Indeed, since I became a Transport Minister, I have spent a good deal of my life answering his perfectly proper and assiduous inquiries and representations on behalf of his constituents on transport-related affairs. He is right that there is a history of congestion in that area, and I would be more than happy to look at it and take his advice and guidance on the matter.

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

Back in September, the Public Accounts Committee described the Government’s approach to local road maintenance, which, as we know, is a major cause of congestion, as “ludicrous”. Now, despite the rather bashful claims that the Minister has made today about Monday’s road announcement, I have not actually heard members of the PAC queuing up to say that they have changed their mind. Does that not tell him something?