Automated Vehicles Bill [ Lords ] (First sitting)

Debate between Robin Millar and Bill Esterson

Committee stage
Tuesday 19th March 2024 Public Bill Committees

[Bill Esterson]

We have had an unexpectedly wide debate on the first group of amendments. I welcome the contributions by hon. Members. I am sure that all our debates will be similarly robust.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Easington for explaining what we are trying to do. Red herrings were being put forward: no one is trying to ban automated vehicles by saying that we should have the highest possible safety standards. I hope that Government Members might reconsider the way in which they framed their interventions.

[Robin Millar]

rose—

[Bill Esterson]

I hope that the hon. Member for Aberconwy will agree with me that we want the highest possible safety standards.

[Robin Millar]

I am happy to clarify my remarks. The reference to banning stuff is actually a euphemism for an over-regulatory approach.

[Bill Esterson]

I am going to look up the word “ban” a bit later and see whether “euphemism” appears next to it. I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for clearing that up. As I said in my opening remarks, the Government rightly accepted the phrase “careful and competent” in the Bill in the Lords. It is about putting a clear statement of intent in the regulations on the importance of safety in a so-far undeveloped technology. The comments by my hon. Friend the Member for Easington on the current concerns about where technology has reached were well made. What we want to do is remove the fear, risk and elements of concern.

On the point made by the right hon. Member for North West Cambridgeshire, absolutely, we want to make the most of this technology for economic purposes. The figures from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders demonstrate that there will be something like 300,000 jobs between now and 2040, and £66 billion added to GDP. We very much want to make the most of those opportunities.

I suggest that having strong safety principles and the safest industry in the world is one of the ways in which we achieve exactly that goal. Having credibility, and the reputation for developing technology that is usable anywhere and is very safe, will be part of delivering the economic benefits. The expression, “careful and competent”, is not defined in statute; it is subject only to case law. The phrases “very low risk” and “a high standard of safety” are not defined. I completely accept those points. What is important is that we set out the intention in this legislation for the courts, which may well have to adjudicate at some point. That is why these amendments were important. I have listened to what the Minister said, and at this stage I do not feel that there is merit in pushing the amendments to a vote. However, I hope that he and other Members will take on board the fact that we are trying to set out our intention with as strong an opposition as possible in this framework legislation—yes, for secondary legislation, whenever that comes, but also for the courts, if they have to adjudicate. I will happily not press the two amendments in this group.

Road Humps and 20 mph Speed Limits

Debate between Robin Millar and Bill Esterson

Tuesday 5th December 2023 Westminster Hall

[Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)]

This has been a very interesting debate, not least because we have heard a variety of opinions about the different approaches in different parts of the United Kingdom. Those demonstrate the vital importance of local decision making to reflect the different needs in different parts of the country.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bootle (Peter Dowd), as he confessed, is a constituent of mine. He has speed bumps outside his house, in one of the villages in my constituency, but he made a point about his constituency, which is urban. Over the years—this also happens in the more urbanised parts of my constituency—people have used urban and suburban roads as rat runs and, in some cases, racetracks. For many people in residential areas where such things happen, it is entirely appropriate that road safety measures are introduced, and I am sure that nobody here today would disagree with that statement. He also made the point about there being 1,700 deaths a year and that thousands more people are seriously injured.

[Robin Millar]

I spoke at length about the situation in Wales. The hon. Gentleman talks about statistics and the impact of these measures. Does he agree with what the Labour Government in Wales have done with their blanket imposition of the presumption of a 20 mph limit?

[Bill Esterson]

The hon. Gentleman will know that compared with the Welsh Government’s approach, our approach in England as the Opposition—I will come to this in more detail—is to allow, enable and support local decision making and subsidiarity. Actually, that is also true in Wales, where local authorities can reinstate 30 mph zones, and my understanding is that that is happening. So the situation is not quite as simple as it has sometimes been portrayed in the media, as he well knows. However, it is for Parliament to set the framework that my hon. Friend the Member for Bootle discussed, and it is not for Parliament to tell local authorities what to do.

I thought that the hon. Member for Meon Valley (Mrs Drummond) made a very important case for local decision making, with her description of the rural roads and the A32 in her constituency. In contrast, I think the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Richard Foord) managed to mention every single village in his constituency during his speech. I cannot imagine why he might have done that, but I am sure that there is a very good reason. Nevertheless, he powerfully made the point about the difference in the likely outcome if somebody is hit by a vehicle travelling at 20 mph as opposed to one travelling at 30 mph. The likelihood of someone dying is five times greater if they are hit at 30 mph than if they are hit at 20 mph. He touched on the point that drivers are also pedestrians, and sometimes cyclists and bus passengers, too. This is not a straightforward situation.

Our approach as a Labour Opposition and, hopefully, as an incoming Government is that it is for local communities to decide where 20 mph zones are implemented. I agree that local authorities and the people in their areas are best placed to know what works and what does not. It should not be the job of officials or Ministers in Whitehall to meddle.

It is disappointing that the Government seem determined to undermine democratically elected representatives and their communities. That is the reading of what they set out in October 2023 in their proposals, which included phrases such as taking steps “to stop councils”. The removal of local authorities’ access to DVLA data, vital for enforcement through the use of cameras, is among measures that undermine and intervene in an unhealthy and divisive way.

The irony of what the Government set out in their proposals, as the right hon. Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith) said in his opening speech, is that it was a Conservative Government in the late 1980s and early 1990s who first gave local authorities the power to implement road safety measures, because they knew that people wanted to protect schools and some residential streets.

Subsidy Control Bill (Seventh sitting)

Debate between Robin Millar and Bill Esterson

Thursday 4th November 2021 Public Bill Committees

[Robin Millar (Aberconwy) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Bill Esterson]

The hon. Gentleman is wearing a mask, so I will give way.

--- Later in debate ---

[Robin Millar]

Is it not precisely the point that this does reflect the devolved agreement, because the Secretary of State has those reserved powers?

[Bill Esterson]

I think the hon. Gentleman missed the point I was making, but there we go. It is entirely appropriate, given that the regime is a four-nation regime, that the four nations have the powers of call-in to the CMA in the way that our amendment sets out.

[Robin Millar]

This is an important point, so I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way again so soon. There is no four nations concept within our constitution. We have one United Kingdom Government and three devolved Administrations. Four nations is something reserved for rugby matches and the vernacular—[Interruption.] Indeed, the rugby is six. It is not something within our constitution. He has referred to the four nations on several occasions, and on this occasion I feel it is important and relevant to make that point.

[Bill Esterson]

I suspect that more than one party would be very interested in repeating those remarks multiple times, certainly in two of the nations of this country. They are called nations within the devolved settlement; we have a devolution settlement that has “four nations” within it. It will be interesting to see how many times the hon. Gentleman is quoted saying that.

I will quote what George Peretz told us about why it matters that there should be a call-in power for all four nations:

“In a situation where an English local authority, the Secretary of State or another UK Government body acting as an English Department does something that is designed to benefit England but causes serious concern in Scotland or Wales, why should the Welsh or Scottish Ministers not be able to do the same thing if the concern is with competition or investment within the United Kingdom? I find it slightly hard to see what the argument against that is.”––[Official Report, Subsidy Control Public Bill Committee, 26 October 2021; c. 44, Q63.]

I have not heard from either the hon. Member for Clwyd South or the hon. Member for Aberconwy an argument against what he told us last week.

Rachel Merelie, senior director for the Office for the Internal Market at the CMA, noted:

“It is really important that all granting authorities are treated fairly and equitably, regardless of whether they are in the devolved nations or in England.”––[Official Report, Subsidy Control Public Bill Committee, 26 October 2021; c. 69, Q98.]

I am not the only one talking about the devolved nations by any means; we have it from the CMA.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bill Esterson]

We have concerns about the way the clause allows the Secretary of State to use regulations to affect the content and form of CMA reports. This is a question of the CMA’s independence. On the Competition and Markets Authority website, it describes itself as

“an independent non-ministerial department”.

The CMA’s work

“is overseen by a Board, and led by the Chief Executive and senior team. Decisions in…investigations are made by independent members of a CMA panel.”

In contrast, the clause would empower the Secretary of State to amend, by using regulations, the content of the CMA’s reports. It is very hard to see how this is anything other than a direct contradiction of the principle of independence, baked into the CMA’s set-up.

The timing of the change, given the shameful proceedings in the Commons Chamber yesterday, leaves the suspicion that it is, again, about removing the principle of independence from the heart of the CMA’s role. We saw this with the Prime Minister’s own adviser on ministerial standards, Sir Alex Allan, resigning because of the breach of the ministerial code, and we saw it yesterday with members of the ruling party scrapping the rules or attempting to scrap the rules on MPs’ conduct because one of their own was found guilty of what the Standards Committee described as an “egregious” breach and then wanting to scrap the role of the independent standards commissioner.

[Robin Millar]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Bill Esterson]

Of course, they will all want to intervene—