Vehicle Technology and Aviation Bill (First sitting)
Steve Baker Excerpts(7 years, 4 months ago)
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Drew Hendry
Q Very briefly, in terms of public confidence and liability issues, you mentioned safety. Do you feel the Bill should address public confidence in the maintenance of vehicles? How will that be conducted across the different standards?
Steve Gooding: We need the construction of new standards for whether a vehicle is judged road-worthy in the first place, to the subsequent—as we call it—MOT system, which continues to verify over time that that road-worthiness is being maintained. We need both systems to cope with the new technology.
Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
Q I am conscious that cars can be converted to use LPG if they are petrol. It seems to me that potentially they could be converted to use hydrogen, as well. Mr Wong, is that something that the industry has considered?
David Wong: It is certainly in the mix. Cars today are being retrofitted as dual fuel vehicles, so, hydrogen in an internal combustion engine. For example, a company in the north-west called ULEMCo is doing that with a good degree of success. It is important to look at the outcome from such a conversion. Will it help to achieve the targets? Will it be below 75 grams of carbon dioxide per kilometre? The jury is still out on that, to be honest. We need to see whether technologies can help over a period of time to decarbonise road transport, not simply the conversion of any sort of technologies or even the hybridisation of any of these fuels.
Mr Baker
Q To be clear, can you explain why we cannot get carbon below 75 grams when we are burning hydrogen? If we burn hydrogen, we get water. Where does the carbon come in?
David Wong: For a fuel cell electric vehicle, you get zero tail pipe emission, but for a dual fuel vehicle, it depends on the dual fuel.
Mr Baker
Q I did not mean fuel cell, but an internal combustion engine running exclusively on hydrogen. Why could you not do that?
David Wong: You can probably use the fuel cell as a range extender for electric vehicles, but to have an internal combustion engine that basically burns fossil fuels and then you have hydrogen—
Mr Baker
Q The point I am making is that a car with an internal combustion engine could be converted to run on hydrogen as an internal combustion engine, could it not?
David Wong: In principle, yes, but I hesitate to give a straightforward answer because we do not describe a hydrogen vehicle as an internal combustion engine. That is the parlance we use for combustion, which, at the moment, is petrol or diesel. We like to frame hydrogen in the context of clean energy.
Mr Baker
Q Okay. I’ll move on from hydrogen in the interests of time. My other point is security. I am a former software engineer. I have got two points about software. First, have you considered cybersecurity and the risks of cars being hacked and people finding themselves driving to destinations they did not intend to go to?
David Williams: Absolutely. In the Flourish consortium there is a specific focus on cyber. Also, in the Venturer consortium, BAE Systems is involved and does military-grade cybersecurity. We should be worried about cyber risks, but we should be worried about those generally, not just with regard to vehicles. There are ways to make things safer. It will be a key element of the communication programme and the technological development of these vehicles in making sure that they are as safe as they can be.
Mr Baker
Q So is there a provision missing from the Bill in relation to cybersecurity?
David Williams: The only area that we think needs further debate is whether insurers will pay for claims in the first instance where there is an incident, but what if there was a massive terrorist incident that caused a problem with a huge number of vehicles globally? That may need separate consideration. The problem is, even in saying that, it is almost scaremongering about that risk. Clearly, we would rather focus on protecting vehicles. You are used to virus protection and those sorts of things. We are talking about new technology. We need to get to the same state where people have confidence.
Steve Gooding: The Bill recognises the risk of tampering, which is a version of cyber-hacking. The construction and use regime, which says a vehicle is roadworthy, must take into account that it is roadworthy and protected from the risk of cybercrime.
Mr Baker
Q Finally, on tampering, the point I made on Second Reading was that that section of the Bill that can exclude or limit an insurance liability after alterations to the vehicle’s operating system, or a failure to install software updates to the vehicle’s operating system, is a drafting point. The provision should simply state “software” rather than “operating system”, because there is firmware and there will be application software. You are nodding, Mr Naberezhnykh. Can I ask you to put on the record whether that is correct and the Bill should be drafted in terms of software and not only the operating system?
Denis Naberezhnykh: My concern is that, were it to be tested in court, the Bill would not achieve its intended aim if, for example, application software had been tampered with or firmware had not been updated. I appreciate it is a technical point.
Steve Gooding: I think you need to ensure that the breadth that you are describing is covered. I suspect that is a question you need to put to the drafting counsel rather than us.
Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)
Q Thank you, Chair. If the Government were to pick a winner at this stage, do we not run the risk of skewing future research and development investment by saying to developers, “The traditional battery is the route we are going down”? If hydrogen is 10 years away, we run the risk of it becoming further away because we are not putting the investment into it now to ensure that technology is comparable in the future.
Quentin Willson: That is a hard question to answer. If you look at the price of the Toyota Mirai, which is a hydrogen car, it is £60,000. Volume and economies of scale make it an enormously difficult task to get that to a consumer level of £15,000. I think the OEMs will find it very tough to find this fuel technology at a cheap enough price point to make it viable. In terms of commercial vehicles and buses, I think it has a greater resonance, but in terms of consumers, if I were sitting at the board table of BMW, Mercedes, Audi or VW, I would be looking at electrification rather than putting all my eggs on hydrogen.
Mr Baker
Q I think that you just hit on the nub of the matter. A board director has major capital investments to protect, which means that they are inclined to stay within trammels once a technology is established. That is very much the point that my hon. Friend the Member for North West Hampshire has been making: there is a danger that we could end up choosing the wrong technology because a whole system of incentives sets up people to stick with electric.
Quentin Willson: The brutal fact of the matter is that getting hydrogen from point A to point B requires pipework. You can have static hydrogen stations that manufacture it, but they will be the size of shipping containers. If you look down the road, creating infrastructure and points, keeping it cheap and making it not a by-product of refining chlorine are all barriers to entry that are much greater than for electrification, which is simple and understandable; it is a currency that we are familiar with now, and we have the electric network. These are the major barriers to hydrogen uptake.
Robert Evans: To follow up on that point, Innovate UK and the Advanced Propulsion Centre are funding research and development projects involving hydrogen fuel cells, and they have done so throughout the period of the low-carbon vehicle innovation platform. The Office for Low Emission Vehicles recently put forward funding for both hydrogen stations and vehicles in deployment.
I think the challenge at the moment is that you could put a very large amount of money on the table and say, “Here’s the money; will you bring the vehicles?”, but the supply of vehicles is very limited. Quantities are still small, as has been explained, and they are very expensive, so the car industry is not looking to flood the market with these vehicles. What we are doing in the UK is being ready for the time when the vehicles will come in larger volumes. We will have a receptive market, and we have infrastructure here in London. What London has done is really positive progress that is viewed as a beacon for how the rest of the UK could be ready to deploy hydrogen fuel cell vehicles when they are ready and cost-effective, and when the supply comes to the UK.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
Q I have a few questions from a pre-selected list. It is probably best to ask about electric charging, to follow on from the discussion. The Government say that electric charging infrastructure makes more sense just now, and that hydrogen is still a wee way off. Can the panel advise what has been learnt today about the required structure of the charging network needed? Will the Bill and the current regime ensure that there will be adequate numbers of charging points in each part of the country?
On Second Reading we heard about the gathering of statistics on the current variance in the number of charging points. Orkney, for example, has many more charging points than some big towns in England. Also, is there a need for a uniform way to access charging points? Is the legislation as proposed sufficient for that? I rolled quite a few questions into one.
Vehicle Technology and Aviation Bill (Second sitting)
Steve Baker Excerpts(7 years, 4 months ago)
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Drew Hendry
Q Can I press you for some thoughts on other charging technologies? That was the last part of my question.
Edward Woodall: I do not have a great deal to add on that.
Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
Q Mr Woodall, if I understood correctly—I listened very carefully to the answer about business models, because the same question occurred to me—you said you do not wish to be forced, but you would be happy to be paid one way or another to take charging stations. I am not surprised, but you did not mention profit as an incentive to provide this service to consumers. Can you elaborate? Why did you not mention the potential to make a profit out of charging?
Edward Woodall: Obviously there is a benefit to having charging on a site. I suppose I am focusing, in the context of the Bill, on how it will work in retailers’ thinking about investing in something that is developing in the long term.
Mr Baker
Q Is it just not profitable to provide charging to people?
Edward Woodall: Petrol forecourt sites make their money out of the shop. They do not make their money out of the fuel or the electric charging. That is a very low-margin part of their business. That is why you are seeing so much investment in the sector.
Mr Baker
Q That is what I imagined. To make a profit, you need to get people through as swiftly as possible, get them in the shop spending as much money as possible, and then on they go. Hopefully, they are happy and have had the service they want.
Edward Woodall: It is not quite that simple, but yes.
Mr Baker
Q Suppose you had an energy source that could be changed quickly, instead of over half an hour, would your current business model work? If, for example, we used hydrogen, as we were discussing this morning, your business model would continue to work in the same way, would it not?
Edward Woodall: Yes, but obviously the investment for putting hydrogen on fuel sites is significant. We asked fuel retailers about the cost of putting on electric vehicle charging points, and the estimate was between £50,000 and £60,000 per site, depending on the site. That increases significantly for hydrogen sites, because the infrastructure behind that is much bigger and more expensive, and it is a harder case to make because fewer consumers use that type of fuel source.
Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)
Q Earlier, in the discussion with Rob, there was discussion about phraseology—about large fuel retailers or just retailers—and an issue with forecourts. I want to clarify something. I am not sure if forecourts are mentioned in the Bill, so is that a red herring? Is it not going to be up to the retailers to site the charging points where they are most convenient?
Following on from the previous question, if you are not blocking the forecourt, a rapid charger may take 30 minutes, but is that not an opportunity for sales if it is the shops that make all the money? I would have thought that for somebody who is travelling, if it is an intermediate store, it would be an ideal opportunity to park and charge their car, go into the shop, buy a newspaper or a magazine and a few snacks, sit in their car, then move on. Is there not a business opportunity there?
Edward Woodall: Yes, there is. As we said in our submission, only 11% of sites have seating areas for customers, so there might not be the capacity to manage all that. Equally, how big is a forecourt site? Think about your local forecourt site—how many cars can it fit? For some of these electric vehicle charging areas, they will not consider it unless it is an acre or an acre-and-a-half-sized site.
Teresa Sayers: Certainly, the charging sites would have to be on the periphery of a forecourt. The current configuration of estates has very limited space to accommodate any parked vehicles. As was previously mentioned, the business model is a very high throughput of vehicles. The maximum duration on the forecourt is usually below five minutes—they fill up, pay and leave. It is just not built and configured to have additional cars there for a very long period of time.
Drew Hendry
Q Just to press that point about the end-to-end availability, is enough being done to ensure that you get truly wide coverage to allow people from outlying areas to get out and back again in the new technology?
Iain Forbes: It is an important bit of work that will need to be done as we develop out the technology. We are investing in connected vehicle test-beds to understand what the requirement is, and certainly one aim of that work is to try to understand how it can benefit everyone, not just people in cities.
Mr Baker
Q I would like to turn to clause 4, which relates to accidents resulting from unauthorised alterations or failure to update software. Hopefully, you have had a chance to look at this section of the Bill. It is all couched in terms of the operating system—interference with and failure to update the operating system. I am concerned that there are other aspects of software in a car that are relevant. Are you satisfied that the Bill is in the right shape, referring to the operating system, or would you prefer to see some other definition, in which case, what?
Iain Forbes: I guess it is my team that has been looking at the Bill, so I will ask Mr Howarth to comment first.
Ben Howarth: From our perspective, my initial reading of it was that it covered what we thought it was, and I am thinking it is the technology. I have to say, I am not a software expert, so if the wording could be clearer—the clause basically says you are not liable if a stupid individual mucks around with the car’s systems and does things that the manufacturer would not permit.
Mr Baker
Q We have a shared understanding of the purpose of this clause. I should say that I am a software engineer—or at least I was before I first came here—and I am slightly concerned that if this was tested in court and somebody had interfered or failed to update their firmware—a low level software—or if the driving was done by application software sitting on top of the operating system, the purpose of the Bill, of which we have a shared understanding, could be defeated. You are saying that you have not formed a view on whether “operating system” is the right definition.
Ben Howarth: To be fair, I do not think we have looked into the wording in that much detail. If the wording needs to be clearer, we would support that. We definitely want the same thing.
Rob Marris
Q I have three quick points for Mr Howarth. First, the Bill talks about the vehicle being insured as opposed to what currently happens, from my understanding, which is that driver is insured. So I have policy motor insurance that enables me to drive certain vehicles, including my principal one. Is the insurance industry happy with what appears to be a change in focus—that is it now on the vehicle rather than the driver?
Ben Howarth: I think it is not a huge change in focus. In practice, the enforcement that industry currently does—via the motor insurance bureau—to check that you have insurance is done via the vehicle. It is done by checking licence plates. The responsibility is on the human driver, but the practical enforcement is to check whether that car, on the road, at that time, is covered by insurance. This Bill is primarily designed for vehicles that will be manually driven some of the time and automated some of the time. It is just the practicality that, once you are switching to an automated car, you need to be thinking about the car rather than the driver.
Drew Hendry
I should say that justice is devolved to Scotland, but I was curious about your views. Thank you.
Mr Baker
Q I want to pick up remarks that I made on Second Reading about the seriousness of the offence. As the Bill is framed, it is an offence only if the person shines or directs a laser beam at a vehicle that is in the course of a journey. As police officers, do you have adequate powers if a person is assaulted with a laser when not in a vehicle? You are nodding.
Richard Goodwin: If we are talking about retinal damage, we are talking about grievous bodily harm.
Mr Baker
Q Could you be clear on why those powers would not be adequate in the case of an aircraft in flight?
Richard Goodwin: It is difficult to prove, over that distance, the person’s intent. They are arguably shining the laser at an object. It is very difficult to be accurate at that point. It may be a reckless consequence, so there is potential for that, but there are various scientific opinions on what damage can be done at certain distances and angles, and depending on the strength of the laser—bits and pieces like that. Having said that, if somebody shines a laser and a plane crashes, there is a lot of injury to a lot of people; the consequences at that end are obviously catastrophic.
Mr Baker
Q You have pre-empted what I was going to ask. Can I ask BALPA whether it is possible that an attack with a laser could cause the loss of an aeroplane?
Martin Drake: Oh yes, absolutely. Most laser strikes happen within 3 miles of the threshold of the runway, when most aircraft are busy completing the due diligence checks that we do: “Are the wheels down? Are the flaps in the right place? Am I lined up with the runway?”—the things that pilots do all the time subconsciously. You approach at about 150 knots at that stage, so you are doing 2.5 miles a minute and are somewhere around the 1,000-foot mark. You are using all the visual cues that you get from the runway. The vast majority of these strikes happen at night, and you are using all lights. Your instruments are lit up. We have mostly cathode ray tube or LED instrumentation on the flight deck; there are very few aircraft still flying around with the old-fashioned dial-type instruments. The potential for a pilot to confuse whether he is looking at the centre line or a side set of lights—particularly in a crosswind, when you are canted over to deal with that—is huge. It is quite conceivable that if both pilots were affected by the dazzle effect at a critical stage of flight, they could attempt to land down the side of the runway, rather than down the centre of it.
Mr Baker
Q With that factor in mind, I have tabled an amendment to probe the Government’s position. It would double the term of imprisonment. The Bill sets out a term not exceeding five years; my amendment would take that to 10 years, because I had this point in mind. I should say that it is a probing amendment to provoke this conversation. What do you think the appropriate term of imprisonment should be for a deliberate attempt to dazzle at that point in the flight?
Martin Drake: You are very much into a catastrophic eventuality. Might I draw your attention to the aircraft that crashed on the threshold of Heathrow during the hours of daylight—the 777 that had the fuel issue? Had that occurred at night, the pilots would have really struggled to make the decisions that they made, and to get the aeroplane where they did. Had the pilots been dazzled or distracted by a laser, I very much doubt that that would have been successful as it was.
Mr Baker
Q In the circumstances—I ask this to the police officers—what is the appropriate maximum punishment?
Simon Bray: I would be reluctant to comment on what an appropriate sentence would be. We would recognise that it is being treated seriously and it is obviously a matter for the courts to determine how sentences given by Parliament should be dealt with on a case-by-case basis. We would not want to put a figure on it, to be honest—[Interruption.] My colleague mentioned that you are potentially talking about something in the region of manslaughter for that type of offence.
Richard Burden
Q Commander Bray, you mentioned that you have written looking for a defined power for stop and search relating to lasers.
Simon Bray: Yes.
Kit Malthouse
Q Yes, hovercraft are covered as a vessel.
Martin Drake: Yes. These are not in the scope of the Bill, but we have come across goalkeepers being lasered when an important penalty is to be taken, and we have heard of referees being lasered. It is a transport Bill, so it is not within the scope of that, and I know the police have powers to deal with it, but it is a growing problem.
Mr Baker
Q Captain Drake, you mentioned that you have got windows in your office from which you have had spectacular effects when you have shone lasers at them. For the purposes of public education, have you considered letting some videos go out there to wherever to show us what happens?
Martin Drake: We have, yes. There is some nervousness about publicising what happens because countries where that has been done have seen a spike in events. That may be a cost we have to bear: we may have to see a spike in events then to see a contraction. We could do that—it is a very sensible idea.
The Chair
There are no further questions from members of the Committee. I thank the witnesses for their evidence, time and co-operation. That has been most helpful. I ask you to remain seated for just a moment while I invite the Whip to move the Adjournment. Line-by-line consideration of the Bill will begin at 11.30 am on Thursday in Committee Room 10.
Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned.—(Jackie Doyle-Price.)
Vehicle Technology and Aviation Bill
Steve Baker ExcerptsMonday 6th March 2017
(7 years, 4 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Vehicle Technology and Aviation Bill 2016-17 View all Vehicle Technology and Aviation Bill 2016-17 Debates Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Chris Grayling
I think that the hon. Gentleman has misunderstood the point. The two-dimensional insurance policy will cover both the vehicle and the driver. If the driver is at the wheel, the insurance policy will cover the liability of the driver, but if a car is driving itself, the insurance policy will be extended to cover the vehicle. In that way, we cover all eventualities and make it possible for those cars to operate on our roads when the technology is ready for them to do so. That important step has been welcomed by the insurance industry. It opens the door to a new generation of vehicles on our roads, and it sends a message to the automotive industry and the world that we in this country are going to make sure that we have the right regulatory framework to enable those vehicles to operate.
I now change modes and move on to aviation.
Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
Before my right hon. Friend changes modes, I know that he would be very disappointed if I did not mention motorcycling. I notice that the word “motorcycle” does not appear in the document “Pathway to Driverless Cars”. That initially pleased me because, as he will realise, an autonomous motorcycle would be entirely pointless, but I am slightly concerned about whether we have adequately considered the ability of driverless cars to coexist safely on our roads with motorcycles. Since I am on my feet, may I also say that many of his objectives could be achieved with a small modal shift to motorcycling?
Chris Grayling
My hon. Friend is a great champion of the motorcycle, and I cannot for a moment imagine him wanting to have anything to do with an autonomous motorcycle. Given the pleasure that he derives from motorcycling, I cannot imagine him sitting on the back of his bike and reading the paper while the vehicle drives itself along.
One important part of the insurance changes for which the Bill paves the way is ensuring that the insurance framework gives comfort to all on the roads, and that proper insurance is in place if there is, God forbid, an unfortunate “non-interaction”—in other words, not the sort of interaction that we would wish—between any vehicle and an autonomous vehicle, and certainly between a motorbike and an autonomous vehicle. It is really important to get that right. Of course, the technology is some way from being sufficiently clearcut and dependable to enable such vehicles to operate freely and openly on our roads as a matter of daily routine, but that day will come.
Sir Greg Knight (East Yorkshire) (Con)
I welcome the Bill and congratulate the Government on introducing it. I also congratulate the Department for Transport team. From time to time, we have had something of a mixed bag of Ministers at the Department, but we now have one of the best teams ever. Long may they stay in office. I declare an interest as chair of the all-party parliamentary historic vehicles group and the owner of a number of historic vehicles. It may seem a little odd to some that I, with an interest in historic vehicles and dedicated to preserving old vehicles and to ensuring that all are free to continue to use them on public highways, should welcome a Bill that seeks to take a step forward. However, I see nothing unusual in that because motoring has always been about pushing forward the frontiers. We can preserve the past, while embracing the future.
Only a decade or so ago, referring to driverless cars would have felt like something from a sci-fi comic to many people, but the very invention of a moving vehicle powered by a machine was revolutionary in its day, and the motor car has always had its detractors since those early days. In 1899, a Member of this House, John Douglas-Scott-Montagu bought his very first motor car—a 12 hp Daimler vehicle. He acquired the car in May, and in the summer of that year he drove it to the House of Commons for the first time, being the first parliamentarian to do so. When he got to the House of Commons, he was prevented from entering the precincts by a policeman on duty, who warned him that he thought there was a very real risk of the contraption blowing up the Palace of Westminster. So Mr Douglas-Scott-Montagu did what any good MP would and should do and appealed to the Speaker, one William Gully, who looked at the evidence, read up about this new-fangled thing—a car powered by a machine rather than a horse—and decided that the Member could bring the car into the precincts, so the very first spat between the police and a motorist was decided in the motorist’s favour.
As the Secretary of State and the hon. Member for Middlesbrough (Andy McDonald) have said, the Bill primarily but not exclusively addresses the advent of automated vehicles. Public transport is not an option for everyone, but neither is driving. Having automated vehicles on our roads will provide an opportunity to liberate people, particularly in rural areas, who are not able to use public transport and who cannot drive but who will grasp the opportunity to use an automated car. However, I will probably be one of the last people to switch to using an automated vehicle, because I enjoy driving. The most recent car I purchased has an intelligent cruise control system, and the car applies the brakes on its own if someone pulls out in front of me. I find that most infuriating because, time after time, the car applies the brakes when I can see that the motorist who pulled out in front of me is accelerating and I would not have applied the brakes. At the moment, I am not a fan of driverless cars. I cannot ever see myself owning a driverless car, but I can see that they will fill a niche in the market and that they will become invaluable to some people.
The hon. Member for Middlesbrough raised concerns about insurance costs, and the Department’s figures indicate that about 97% of all road accidents are caused by driver error, not by vehicle condition. If the software is anything like competent, it should lead to a reduction in the number of accidents and, one would hope, a reduction in insurance premiums.
Mr Baker
My right hon. Friend says that he will never buy a driverless car, and we are of one mind. I cannot imagine buying a driverless car, and my first question would always be, “How do I turn these things off?” Does he share my concern that, as more driverless cars become available, there will be an increasing pressure on us all to drive up safety by getting a driverless car and that the great hobby of motoring, which he and I enjoy, might come under increasing pressure as the years go by?
Sir Greg Knight
Coming under increasing pressure, particularly from the Whips, has never bothered my hon. Friend, so I cannot see that it will be a problem in this instance.
I have a number of questions for the Minister. I think it is self-evident, but I presume that clause 1, which gives the Government power to list automated vehicles for the purpose of approved road use, also includes the right to delist any model that is shown to be unreliable or more susceptible to accidents than other models that are allowed to operate.
Clause 2 contains details on the liability of insurers where an accident is caused by an automated vehicle, but those provisions raise a number of questions. Clearly, the Government think that, if an automated vehicle in automated mode is involved in an accident due to a problem with its manufacture, the insurance policy taken out by the owner will cover the costs of any damage caused in the accident but that, at a later stage, the insurance company will be able to pursue the manufacturer. That is my understanding.
I want to know what happens when no accident is caused but the law is nevertheless broken. Let me give the House an example. I assume that if a driverless car is travelling on the M1, the software would know that the vehicle is on a road where the speed limit is 70 mph. However, some stretches of the M1 are what the Government call “smart motorways”, where a Highways England official has the authority to turn on flashing lights and lower the speed limit to a speed the official thinks appropriate for the road conditions. Let us suppose that a driver in full automated mode on the M1 comes to a stretch of smart motorway and finds that Highways England has suddenly switched the speed limit down to 50 mph. If a police car is travelling behind and the automated car is slow in responding to the reduced limit, the police may stop the automated car and issue a speeding ticket. Who would then be responsible for the speeding ticket and who, if anyone, would take the three points that normally go with a speeding offence? If the owner, who would otherwise be the driver if the vehicle was in manual mode, was relying entirely on the car, he should not be guilty of the offence of speeding and should certainly not have his licence endorsed. The Bill says nothing about this, and I hope the Minister will give us some clue about what the police would be expected to do in that scenario.
Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
I rise to support the Bill with a mixture of joy and apprehension. I feel joy because I see foresee the great things that it will bring to people’s lives. If those who would otherwise not be able to drive find themselves with the liberty of independent travel, that will be a very good thing indeed. I think particularly of people who may be disabled or blind. Also, given the commute I had this morning—I happened to drive in—I think how much it would have been improved if I had not had to drive along the A40. I do view the development of automated vehicles with a degree of joy, but my apprehension, as I indicated earlier, is that I do not want conventional driving to be banned. Some of us enjoy driving or riding a motorcycle as a thing of pleasure and take some joy from the skill of driving for ourselves.
Although a ban may seem a preposterous, ludicrous suggestion, I raise it because an enthusiast for the policy and for driverless vehicle technology took some pleasure in telling me that motorcycling would have to be banned one day because motorcycles cannot, or ought not, to be made autonomous because they would be dangerous alongside self-driving cars. I therefore view such developments with a degree of apprehension.
Tom Tugendhat
Coming all the way from Wycombe, my hon. Friend will know that not only is there the possibility of having driverless vehicles, and therefore autonomous vehicles, but horses could have been abandoned and yet have not been. Despite the fact that technology has moved on, horses have never been more popular than they are today. I hope that my hon. Friend is not assuming that we have to abandon all legacy technologies just because technology moves on.
Mr Baker
My hon. Friend is right. We still enjoy our bicycles and all the rest of it. Should the dread day come that driving is banned, I do not doubt that things would continue on the racetrack, but my point is that an enthusiast for these new technologies—a member of a Conservative party policy group—put it to me with some joy that motorcycles would have to be banned because he considers them dangerous and incompatible with self-driving cars.
Karl MᶜCartney
I thank my hon. Friend and fellow enthusiast for giving way. As someone who has never ridden a horse, a donkey, or even a pony, I can say that some of us already view horses as autonomous vehicles.
Mr Baker
Not only are they autonomous, but I would argue that they are even more dangerous for that very reason. However, that is by the bye and perhaps a diversion from the Bill.
As I said, I am a self-declared petrol head, but we have nothing to fear from electric vehicles. If anyone wants to check my YouTube channel, they will find a review of the Agility Saietta R electric motorcycle—a vehicle with excellent torque—and that brings me on to the idea of charging. It is not a market failure that there is diversity in the marketplace. Competition is not a failure but the way by which we make progress, so I encourage the Government not to stamp out competition and experimentation as we make progress with this new technology and in this new market.
Kit Malthouse
Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government should also encourage competing technologies? One issue with electric vehicles is the method of power storage and, historically, the Government and this House have put a huge amount of effort, resources and subsidy into the battery, and little comparative resource into hydrogen, as a store of power. The fuel cell is the technology of the future, and the battery is possibly a temporary technology like the fax machine. The Government should be allowing such competition, too.
Mr Baker
My hon. Friend is absolutely right and makes a good point. As an idea, the fuel cell’s time is still to come. He makes a wise intervention.
On the substance of the Bill, I exercise my pedantry as an Oxford-educated software engineer—not something I have been able to do recently—by saying that in clause 4, on accidents resulting from unauthorised alterations or failure to update software, subsection (1)(a) addresses
“alterations to the vehicle’s operating system”.
If there is one group of people more pedantic than software engineers, it is lawyers and courts. Should an accident arise because of a failure to update software, that definition would be tested in court.
Underneath the operating system is firmware in non-volatile memory within hardware. The operating system is loaded on to volatile memory, and on top of that is application software. A self-driven or autonomous car will probably run on that application software. If it were to be tested in court, I fear we might find problems if the Bill, as enacted, talks about a vehicle’s operating system.
I encourage the Government to consult specialists in the industry, rather than only taking the advice of an out-of-date software engineer, but it is important that the Bill uses the right terminology to ensure that the right software is updated and that, therefore, the law meets its intended purpose of ensuring that people are insured and that liability falls where it should when there has been a failure to update software.
Stewart Malcolm McDonald
The hon. Gentleman is perhaps trying to get at the lack of detail in the Bill about the regulation of that software. Given what he has just said, such regulation would surely be enormously important.
Mr Baker
That is interesting, and I love the way the hon. Gentleman has framed that for me. The point I was trying to get to is the one I made, which is that the language of clause 4 must be tight enough to ensure that, should it be tested in court, we do not find that the law fails as a result of describing software as the “operating system”, which is the wrong term. I dread the day that this House starts regulating how software is written. Much as I respect my colleagues in this House, the last thing I would want to see in legislation, having been a professional software engineer, is detail of how to write software, particularly safety-critical software. I will be grateful for having done my MSc in computer science when the House is able to have a detailed discussion of Object-Z, but that day is far off. We should not be legislating for how safety-critical systems should be engineered.
I have two other points on the Bill. I am glad we are now legislating for offences relating to the use of lasers. I was an engineer, rather than a pilot, but I can see the issue. The Government are wise. If anything, I would ask whether the penalty is harsh enough given that we could be talking about airliners with large numbers of passengers.
My final point is about drones. Having looked at the legislation on remotely piloted vehicles, I think there is a danger of constraining things not just too tightly but quite wrongly. If we were to regulate drones such as the DJI Phantom, which are hobbyists’ toys for taking video footage, as if they were aircraft, we could end up ruling out perfectly legitimate uses—for example, the man who uses a drone to inspect tiles on rooftops so that he can reduce householders’ bills because, by doing so, he can avoid the expense of putting up the scaffolding that he is now legally required to use before going up on a roof. By investing in a drone and flying it near someone’s home, this person saves the householder a fortune, without endangering them. Were we to regulate these things as aircraft, he would not be able to do that.
Mr Baker
I am grateful for the addition to my workload.
I wish to make a final point about diesel, which has been mentioned. I drive a diesel vehicle, and I am conscious that there is a good argument to say that so many of us are in diesel cars because Governments encouraged us to drive them, in the interests of reducing CO2. Let us not compound one bad incentive with other poor incentives. Let us just be a little more humble about what we encourage people to do in large numbers and leave room for experimentation and for markets to work, provided always that people carry the costs of their own decisions.
Oral Answers to Questions
Steve Baker Excerpts(7 years, 5 months ago)
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Andrew Jones
Northern powerhouse rail is being developed with the platform of HS2 being delivered—we are looking potentially to use parts of the HS2 network for northern powerhouse rail—but the final decisions on the routes through south Yorkshire have not been made. This is a live consultation, running until 9 March, and I ask that the hon. Gentleman participate in it.
Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Andrew Jones)
HS2 Ltd anticipates that draft route management improvement and safety plans, including that for Buckinghamshire covering the A4010, will be available for discussion and consultation with highway authorities in March.
Andrew Jones
My hon. Friend makes an important point. Safety is critical as we go into the delivery phase of HS2. As a result of the petitioning process, the Secretary of State has committed to contributing £480,000 for permanent safety measures along the A4010 and A4129 in Buckinghamshire. The Government have also created a £30 million road safety fund for HS2, the details of which we will be announcing very shortly.
Oral Answers to Questions
Steve Baker Excerpts(8 years, 4 months ago)
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Mr McLoughlin
After my hon. Friend’s very successful campaign, we managed to protect the services in his area when we renegotiated the franchises. He has always pressed for greater services to his constituency. I will look at the issue, particularly when the new franchise starts operating later this year.
Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
12. When construction of High Speed 2 is planned to begin.
The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Mr Robert Goodwill)
A great deal of work has already been completed, and actual construction will start next year.
Mr Baker
Tempted as I am to propose that the Government build HS2 sometime in the Parliament after next, when it will be seen for the white elephant that it is, could the Minister reassure me that there is time enough to deal with all the environmental impacts of HS2, such as the construction impact on the historic village of West Wycombe in my constituency?
Mr Goodwill
My hon. Friend did promise me an impish supplementary question and I was not disappointed. The fact is that we have promised that there will be no net environmental loss during the construction. Indeed, we plan to plant 2 million trees as part of the phase 1 construction. I think it will be a project that we can be proud of and one that communities up and down the country will value as part of our economic plans.
High Speed 2
Steve Baker Excerpts(9 years, 4 months ago)
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Mrs Gillan
That is absolutely right. Many of our local organisations got together in Buckinghamshire and named their organisation 51m, because had the money been spent in another way, it could have resulted in £51 million being available in each and everybody’s constituency to spend on our constituents. I believe that on current pricing, it should be renamed 87m, because it is looking more like £87 million per constituency, but I will come to that later.
Thanks to the brilliant economic management of a Conservative Chancellor of the Exchequer, who has rescued our economy, we have—it is no joke—a solid, long-term economic plan, which is providing the foundations for continuous growth. We need investment in infrastructure and public services, and economic stability against which our private sector can develop and our public services improve.
Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
I hope my right hon. Friend will join me in congratulating the Economic Secretary to the Treasury, who has joined us in the Chamber and has created these excellent conditions. Will my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Mrs Gillan) join me in recognising that things will be very difficult for a number of colleagues in government when they face this project going ahead at great cost to their constituents, with cross-party support? It has a distinctly anti-democratic flavour at times.
Mrs Gillan
I am proud of my colleagues who are in government—and should remain in government—who have spoken up and pointed out the failings of this project from within Government, as I did when I was part of the Government. I have had the good fortune of being liberated on the Back Benches, and am able to speak out freely in public. That is not always possible. However, I always observed Cabinet collective responsibility and only spoke on platforms in my constituency. I wish the same could be said of the Liberal Democrats, who seem to have cast Cabinet collective responsibility, and that sort of responsibility for being in government, to the wind. The politics of convenience are not my politics, so I am proud of the part that my colleagues have played. They have been stalwart compatriots in a very difficult subject area for all of us. None of us here is really naturally a rebel, and this is a difficult issue to grasp, as I hope people will appreciate.
By default, HS2 has been part of that long-term economic plan. As the doubts have been growing about it, I think we need to ask ourselves whether this is the best way forward for the honestly held ambitions of Conservatives for this country—or indeed, of any other party. There is only a small chance that the incoming Government will totally abandon the plans, and if they do, it may now only be because they are being held to ransom by a smaller party. Alex Salmond declared that one of his demands as the price for propping up a Labour Government would be to start the high-speed rail link from Scotland to England, before connecting Birmingham to London.
I like and admire many of my Labour colleagues. No prisoners are ever taken by them, and I am second to none in my admiration for the right hon. Member for Holborn and St Pancras (Frank Dobson), who has trodden this path with me over five years, but surely even the Labour party, should it be successful, would not want that sort of political blackmail as the hallmark of its term in government.
Aviation Strategy
Steve Baker Excerpts(10 years, 9 months ago)
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Sir Alan Haselhurst
The hon. Gentleman anticipates me. I will come to that point, but I am starting with Heathrow, the design of which has been a complete disaster. After three terminals were put in the middle of the runways, more were needed, so terminal 4 had to be on the south side. It was sworn that there would be no further expansion, and BAA consistently said that the idea of moving the Perry Oaks sludge works was out of the question—that it was impractical and that those of us who suggested it did not know what we were talking about—but that is where terminal 5 now stands. Had an intelligent approach been taken to the development of Heathrow, that would have been where all the terminals were put. It was not to be.
Giving BAA control of the three London airports was a huge mistake, and it was extraordinary that the person who had to pilot that proposal through the House was the late Nicholas Ridley, who I do not think believed in that type of monopoly being created. With the passage of time, I think very few hon. Members believe that it was the right policy, and it is now being dismantled.
Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
My right hon. Friend has just mentioned a good free market Conservative and he spent some time eloquently setting out the degree of capital investment in Heathrow. Will he join me in recognising that if we use the power to tax and direct to throw away that capital investment and force scarce capital into a loss-making project in the estuary, this country will become poorer?
Sir Alan Haselhurst
I am coming to that. The problem is that the design of Heathrow is not good and expanding it further—although I recognise that that might happen because in some people’s eyes it is the easiest option, what business most wants and so on—runs the risk of compounding the problem.
The next airport to come on to the horizon was Gatwick. A previous Minister of Civil Aviation said in this House in answer to a question that Gatwick would not be a second London airport but would merely be a diversionary airport for Heathrow. Eventually, of course, the truth came out that it was to be the second London airport.
BAA—I have no time for it—then decided to enter into a pact with West Sussex council not to build a second runway at Gatwick for 40 years, which was the equivalent of the Molotov–Ribbentrop treaty as far as I was concerned. That pact expires in 2019. Having done that, BAA was still anxious to go and find a third airport so it must bear a heavy responsibility for the split situation. Had there been competition between those three airports, we might be in a slightly different place—and this is certainly not the best place.
I agree with the hon. Member for Liverpool, Riverside (Mrs Ellman), the Chairperson of the Transport Committee, that we need a hub airport for our major city. There has been much talk of late of that being old hat, as everything is now point-to-point. Everything is not point-to-point. Point-to-point becomes increasingly possible when traffic increases and routes become, in the language of the trade, thick routes, meaning that so many flights a day can be justified between those points. That is fine and that will go on, but it will be a long time before there is a daily flight between Denver, Colorado and, say, Naples. There will be a need for passengers to interline at an airport and it would be to our advantage commercially, not just for the businesses in London but for the airlines, if British Airways, Virgin or any other British carrier had part of that business. The argument for the split hub, suggesting that interlining is not important, overlooks the fact that many passengers are now not coming through London. They are going to airports in Europe where interlining is more conveniently executed.
I believe that there needs to be a hub in London and I accept that it is perhaps inevitable that that will be Heathrow, but to build a third runway, possibly a fourth runway and a sixth and seventh terminal for that airport will not make it anything like the new airport in Hong Kong, or Changi in Singapore, or the airport in Beijing. It will still be a confusing mass airport. I do not think that that serves London best, but it might be the best that can be achieved in the circumstances.
I absolutely understand why London deserves a decent airport. Our engineers and architects have designed some of the other airports in the rest of the world, so it is a great shame that we cannot give them the chance to build a decent airport for our city.
I am also concerned, as I have a northern history, about balancing this country. I saw the effect of deciding to develop Stansted. One can still walk around the towns and villages of north-west Essex and find a variety of regional UK accents, as people were drawn down to the area. That is all part of a problem that post-war Governments have contested, unsuccessful by and large—that is, the drift from the north to the south. I think that is a great shame.
I was close to Manchester for a time, and I saw the potential for the development of Manchester airport. It has two runways, so why can that potential not be seen? Why not promote that as at least one other gateway into the country? Most air traffic has to do with leisure, and from Manchester not only can the business community be served in that part of the country—going both west to Liverpool and east to Leeds—but there is access to north Wales, the Derbyshire peak district, the Yorkshire dales, Yorkshire moors, the lake district and so on. We ought to encourage those who visit this country to see parts of it other than just London and the home counties. That would take some of the pressure off London, without—of course—excusing the need for a proper hub. I tell my constituents who occasionally ask, “Should we be spending all this money on HS2?” that when I hear that HS2 would bring Birmingham airport within 36 minutes of London, my eyes water because it is an average of 47 minutes from Stansted airport into London.
That brings me to a point about infrastructure. Over the years, our one consistent failing—there have been many—is that we have not been prepared to back airport development with suitable infrastructure for people to get there. So what happens? Well, I can speak for Stansted with some passion. On the back of an airport that we were unhappy to see develop, we did not get the compensation of a good railway system. In fact, we got one that is worse because priority was given on a two-track railway to the Stansted Express. I am all in favour of a good service to Stansted airport, but that must not be at the expense of all the commuters whom Government policies over the years have encouraged to live in the M11 corridor. They get the worst of both worlds and that is wrong.
On compensation, we have been niggardly over the years in the amount of money we are prepared to give to people—it is all spent on long public inquiries, fighting the case and so on, instead of being paid to those people who might feel most affected by the project. We should provide those people with at least some compensation so that if it is necessary in the national interest to bring about a major project, they will at least get some advantage from that. We must do more on that if we are to get people to settle for whatever strategy—if we actually succeed in getting one at the end of all the further deliberation through the Davies commission.
In the late 1960s and during the period of the Heath Government, it was decided, in the name of the environment, to go for an estuarial solution. That was my wish and that would still be the ideal. I do not believe the most pessimistic forecasts about the time and expense it would take. We lack imagination in this country. We struggled over the channel tunnel; we struggled over the rail link to the channel tunnel—we were going to build half of it at one point, and it would be difficult to imagine anything more crazy. Finally, however, we got there. It took us an awfully long time to think about Crossrail before we began building it. Why cannot we realise that London deserves a good airport? The whole country deserves a better deal, and to level up the north.
High Speed Rail (Preparation) Bill
Steve Baker Excerpts(11 years ago)
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Mr McLoughlin
Now, there is a choice. As a bit of a conservative, I will go with seniority, if my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Steve Baker) will forgive me.
Steve Baker
In relation to passenger numbers, my right hon. Friend will know the old aphorism that if one subsidises anything, one gets more of it. Will he remind us how much subsidy the rail industry has received over the past few years?
Mr McLoughlin
One of the things we are trying to do is drive out some of the subsidy in the railways to make it cheaper and more affordable for companies, but it is certainly true that there is subsidy in the rail industry. However, we have to think about people being able to get to work and what that subsidy supports. Sometimes the commuter in London, and the commuter in my hon. Friend’s constituency, deserves that support to enable him to get to the jobs that are available elsewhere. One has to be realistic and understanding about that.
I will now try to make some progress, because I have been speaking for longer than I had intended to take for my whole speech. This is not about a choice between upgrading the existing railway and building a new one. Upgrades will not provide the extra capacity we need. The choice is between a new high-speed line and a new conventional railway. The significant additional benefits make high-speed rail the right answer. Of course, big infrastructure projects are always controversial. As I often say, the easiest thing in the world for the Government to do would be not to build HS2 or to commit to it, but the costs of that would be huge.
It would be a cost in jobs. Our modest estimates indicate that HS2 will create and support 100,000 jobs, while the group of core cities predict that it will underpin 400,000 jobs, 70% of them outside London. It would be a cost in prosperity. Some estimates suggest that HS2 will add over £4 billion to the economy even before it is open. The line is estimated to provide around £50 billion in economic benefits once it is up and running. If we do not go ahead with HS2, there will also be a cost in lost opportunities for the towns and cities in the midlands and the north. I am not prepared to put up with a situation in which someone can get to Brussels on a high-speed train line, but not to Birmingham; to Strasbourg, but not to Sheffield; or to Lille, but not to Leeds. We cannot afford to leave the economic future of our great cities such as Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, Sheffield, Nottingham and Derby to an overcrowded 200-year-old railway.
Motorcycle Licences
Steve Baker Excerpts(11 years, 10 months ago)
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Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
I am extremely grateful to the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes (Norman Baker), for being here to answer the debate tonight. Earlier today I was afraid that there would be nobody left in the Department for Transport to take the matter on. I hope my hon. Friend will not mind too much if I place on record the admiration of a great many motorcyclists for all the work that his colleague and my hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead (Mike Penning) did as roads Minister; he wrestled manfully with the subject.
I declare my interest as a motorcycle owner and rider of about 24 years’ standing with an unrestricted licence. I am chairman of the associate parliamentary group for motorcycling. Motorcycling is a joy, not least because it combines freedom with a crucial need for personal responsibility and skill. Riding well requires consideration, courtesy and concentration. I believe that every serious motorcyclist will pursue the development of their skills as a matter of course, and that that journey begins with basic training and licensing.
Motorcyling is also something for which young people yearn. The journey from being a 15-year-old with a superbike poster on the wall to being the rider of that superbike can feel heart-rendingly long. The smiles on my colleagues’ faces will inform the House that of course I speak of myself. Now, thanks to the EU and the regulations, that journey almost certainly will be heart-rendingly long, if it is undertaken at all. It is therefore with a sense of grinding determination that I bring before the House the issue of licensing individuals to ride motorcycles under European Union legislation.
As my hon. Friend the Minister knows, since the coalition came to power this is not the first battle that bikers have fought against the EU and its intervention in relatively petty matters that infringe on minute details relating to the ownership of their bikes. He and I have corresponded, including through written questions, on so-called anti-tampering legislation, which has no supporting evidence and which may also be related to licensing. I understand that progress has been made and I am grateful to the Government for the vigour with which they pursued that matter. However, the motorcycle community remains very anxious and I am concerned that the Government should defend their rights and freedoms.
There was a time when the EU at least pretended to uphold the principle of subsidiarity, which was originally explained as decisions being taken at the lowest practical level. If that had not long ago been exposed as a sham, the heavy-handed mistreatment of bikers in relation to both anti-tampering and licensing would prove yet again that the doctrine is nothing more than a cynical ruse to distract us from the reality of ruthlessly centralised power over comparatively minor matters—matters that I have found often become mere bargaining chips in protracted negotiations over one bureaucratic matter or another.
I turn to the shambles of the bike test. Brussels-dictated changes to the motorcycling licence regime are far more advanced than the attack on bike modification. The second driving licence directive changed the test. From the beginning of 2003, the Motorcycling Industry Association, the MCI, warned that the proposals were flawed. The MCI argued that the manoeuvres element of the test gold-plated the directive and would require very large test sites; that the size of the sites would in turn greatly reduce the number of proposed test centres; that the Driving Standards Agency proposal was likely to result in a separate off-road element to the test, and that therefore the full cost of a test would rise substantially. Indeed, this is what came to pass when the test was implemented in 2009.
The number of test centres dropped from 223 to fewer than 40. As the new test was in two separate segments tested on different days, fees rose by about 30%. The Driving Standards Agency’s antiquated trainer booking system could not cope with the new two-part tests, creating chaos. The changes were delayed by six months at the last minute, by the late split of the test into two parts, which left trainers and learners in limbo. The result was massive aggravation for trainers and pupils and, more seriously, the beginnings of a potential new problem: permanent learners.
Passing the full test is now so bureaucratic and inconvenient that, two years after passing their initial compulsory basic training, it can be expected that at least some new bikers will choose to take their CBT again so that they can drive for another two years without passing their full test. So a new system supposed to make the roads safer and to make motorcyclists safer could make them less safe by creating permanent learners who are not only not fully qualified road users, but who may be less likely to develop the interest in motorcycling that encourages the development of essential skills. So these changes may be not only expensive and aggravating; they may also be counter-productive.
Following uproar from the motorcycling community, the Transport Committee resolved to look into the matter in July 2009. In March 2010, before the election, the Committee found the DSA’s implementation and delivery to be lacking and agreed with almost all the points made by the industry. However, the DSA seems to have taken little action to address the findings. In June 2010, my hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead, the then new Minister, announced a review into the issue because of widely expressed concerns
“about the safety of the off-road module 1 part of the test and about the difficulty of accessing the limited number of off-road test centres.”
That announcement was warmly received by bikers. The review was due to report in autumn 2010. Here we are, almost two years later, and we still do not have a projected date for publication.
I appreciate that the matter is being looked at thoroughly, in great depth, with dedicated research commissioned and wide consultation undertaken, with results to be provided, presumably, in the fullness of time, but this is too long. The attitude of my hon. Friend the former roads Minister throughout has impressed the biking community, which strongly believed that he was on their side. As a motorcycle action group member, I am sure he was, but as the years roll by with no resolution in sight, some of them are losing faith.
The Government deserve full credit for the interim mini-fixes that have occurred. Examiners have been redeployed and a few new test sites have opened. Module 1 was slightly amended to become fairer. A single event test is being trialled. Flexibility between modules is sometimes possible. But I put it to the Minister that the core problems remain. More test sites are needed. Geographical coverage is too patchy and bikers believe that trainers working far from the module 1 test centres are going out of business, leaving further gaps in trainer coverage. Some accidents still take place on the module 1 test, which includes manoeuvres that are not necessarily easy to relate to the real world. The two part test remains complicated and bureaucratic for candidates. A single event, on-road test remains the simplest format to understand. Anything else is a discouragement to people considering taking the motorcycle test. The evidence since 2009 proves it.
Progress on the review appears to be painfully slow. It took only six months to split the test in two in 2009, but reconsidering that decision appears to be mired in a highly complex and bureaucratic health and safety process that is still unresolved after two years. Bikers who have been consulted praised the roads Minister and even praise DFT officials, who they believe are doing their best, but they have complained that certain quango officials lack a can-do attitude and that they have been rigid and unrealistic in interpreting the directives. Will Sir Humphrey triumph in both Europe and the UK in thwarting past, present and future Ministers? I implore the Minister to encourage the motorcycle community with a concrete prospect of the review concluding, in the manner that the original policy set out, and with substantive recommendations to improve the shambles left by the previous Government in collusion with the EU.
I regret to report that the misery being inflicted on bikers by the EU does not end there. There is now, in addition, a third driving licence directive, which was translated into domestic law in January 2011. The EU has again left chaos in its wake. In January 2013, the licence categories must change. Currently, to obtain a motorcycle licence a rider must first purchase a provisional motorcycle licence and then pass compulsory basic training, which enables them to ride on the public road with L-plates for up to two years. To obtain a full motorcycle licence, they must pass a motorcycle theory test and then a practical test. There are different categories of licence and two routes to a full licence.
The new system is, of course, more complex: riders under 24 years old will be required to go through more stages and repeats of the same test to reach a full licence; a new A2 category is to be introduced, so four categories replace three, at least if we include the medium-power bike to which riders would be restricted; the age for riding a full-power motorcycle rises from 21 to 24; and the top speeds of restricted mopeds is reduced. I have to say, from my own experience of riding a 50 cc moped, that reducing the top speeds seems to be a measure that could create danger rather than solve it.
How many under-24-year-olds will be willing to jump through all those hoops? How many can afford to? The effect will be to discourage cheap and convenient transport for many young people, which could be a real lifeline to help them into work, and certainly to fulfil their lives. It might add to congestion as people turn to cars instead of bikes. It will certainly secure the primacy of the direct access route for older learners.
As if all that was not complicated enough, 11 months later, in December 2013, the sizing of bikes in the new categories changes again. Rather than having one co-ordinated disruption, the system will have to change and then change again within a year. All those trainers who diligently complied with the new rules and bought equipment in advance could be left out of pocket and up the Swannee by the capriciousness of the EU. It is as if the EU is deliberately trying to cause as much expense and inconvenience as possible. Some cynics have suggested that officials would like to eliminate motorcycling. I would not go that far, but I know that even when the EU consults it does not listen; it goes through the motions and then does what its bureaucrats want anyway.
I appreciate that the Minister is not responsible for Britain’s membership of the EU and that the Government have been attempting to clear up a mess dumped on us by Brussels but, I refer him to the unfinished review and the need for: an easily accessible, single-event test; a testing regime that is easy to understand; cost-effectiveness for both consumers and the institutional structures; and full national coverage. I remind him that the increase in the size of the 125 cc market, together with the reduction in test numbers, might be an early indication of a growing category of permanent learners. If that proves to be the case, the EU-imposed testing regime will be failing by its own standards.
As I conclude my remarks, I will return to where I began by paying tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Hemel Hempstead—he is now in his place—who has really fought for the interests of motorcyclists. Both I and the motorcycling community are grateful for all he has done and wish him well in his new role.
Finally, motorcycling is not merely a form of transport; it is the exercise of liberty under the law, personal responsibility and individual skill. It is sometimes a hobby and sometimes a way of life. It is a joy to which many aspire and which many of us treasure. The EU and the DSA together are working towards ruining it. Will the Government please sort out this mess and tell us when they will do so?
Civil Aviation Bill
Steve Baker Excerpts(12 years, 5 months ago)
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Maria Eagle (Garston and Halewood) (Lab)
Let me begin by wishing the aviation Minister, the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet (Mrs Villiers), well. Opposition Members were very sorry to hear of her accident and we wish her a speedy recovery from her injuries and from the surgery she is undergoing.
The Civil Aviation Bill started its life under the previous Administration and we were pleased, as was the industry, to see it included in the Queen’s Speech after the election. We will vote for the Bill’s Second Reading today and the Government will, in principle, have our continued support, subject to the scrutiny that this Bill should rightly receive as it progresses through its parliamentary stages and subject to the making of appropriate reassurances and necessary amendments.
The proposals that the Government inherited to reform the framework for airport economic regulation and modernise the CAA’s governance and operations are broadly correct. In a number of areas, we share the view of the Select Committee on Transport that the Bill could be improved, particularly in relation to passengers’ welfare and the sector’s environmental obligations. Should the Government not introduce their own proposals to do so we shall seek to improve the Bill in Committee.
We support the Government’s decision to use the legislation as a vehicle to reform and extend the ATOL scheme to provide greater protection for consumers, reflecting changes to the way in which holidays are sold today, as the Secretary of State set out. The Government have also decided to use the legislation to go beyond the economic regulatory purpose that was originally envisaged in the transfer of responsibilities relating to aviation security, which has emerged since the election or, more specifically, since the Government spending review. However, there are serious concerns about whether it is a desire to cut costs, rather than improve security, that is driving the changes. The Opposition will therefore require much greater assurance from the Government about how the changes will work in practice if we are not to seek to make amendments to the provisions or even to remove them during the Bill’s passage through the House.
Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con)
Does the hon. Lady share my concern that passengers, as well as needing security, are worried about convenience and, indeed, their dignity?
Maria Eagle
The hon. Gentleman is correct, and proper security is always a balance between managing to make sure that the efforts of those who wish to commit terrorist offences on planes are foiled while, at the same time, not wishing to subject consumers and passengers to indignity or extensive delay. It is correct that the Department should have a full understanding of the extent of any threats so that it can make appropriate policy. It is just in those areas that we want to probe a little more in Committee precisely to assess the practical impact of the proposals.
It is unfortunate that the introduction of the Bill and its Second Reading should come so soon after the publication of the draft Bill. Considering that this package of reforms has been in preparation for many years, and given that it was widely believed that its introduction had slipped to the next Session, it is unfortunate that there has been a sudden rush of last-minute enthusiasm to bring it before the House. Consequently, the planned pre-legislative scrutiny, which we supported, has been curtailed. The Transport Committee has done its usual impressive job, but it had just three weeks to take evidence and produce recommendations on the proposals, many of which have been in gestation for six years or more. That meant that the Government have not been able to consider those recommendations in detail and improve the Bill before its introduction. Consequently, we are debating a Bill—and I hope that this is the case—that will doubtless be amended by the Government in Committee, which is a remarkable state of affairs for a measure so long in preparation.
The industry itself has rightly expressed concern about the limited opportunity it was given to engage with officials before the Bill’s introduction in Parliament. BAA, it is fair to say, may be affected more than other player in the industry by the measure, yet it says that it could secure only a single one-hour meeting with the Department for Transport in the past three months, which falls short of what might be expected for a regulatory Bill of this nature. There will be, at the very least, a suspicion that the hasty introduction of the Bill has less to do with the industry’s needs and more to do with the needs of business managers, who doubtless begged the Secretary of State to let them have something for the Commons to do, because the Government’s legislative programme is bogged down in chaos in the other place.
Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (Con)
It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Chris Heaton-Harris), who told us about his courting days under the Heathrow flight path. I am sure that colleagues were delighted to hear that he still regularly returns to Heathrow with his now wife. It is not clear whether they do this on their anniversary or not, but it seems that a certain amount of shopping at Heathrow is involved.
I am also pleased to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Witham (Priti Patel), who put the case for Essex very well and looked strongly after the interests of her constituency and Essex more widely in her remarks about Stansted, the strong progress on expansion and the strong economic role being performed at Southend. I know that the councils for Southend, Thurrock, Medway, Kent and Essex are working together as a local economic partnership on sensible proposals on aviation and alternative options to the Thames estuary option, which was so ably dismissed by my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Jackie Doyle-Price). The Secretary of State was not in her place at that time, but I have every confidence that the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for Lewes (Norman Baker) will pass on those very strong arguments in private as strongly as he does in public. Let me also take this opportunity to thank the Secretary of State for the very strong support she has shown for our area by holding back the increase in the Dartford tolls and in what she has done on train regulation and fares.
The debate has been largely non-partisan. Indeed, the regulation of aviation has been a non-partisan and technical area on which both parties have worked closely with Whitehall going back all the way to 1967 when the Edwards committee first looked at aviation regulation. It took a full two years to report, in 1969, to the then Secretary of State Anthony Crosland, and the report led to a White Paper from the then Labour Government. With the new Conservative Government in 1970 came the Civil Aviation Bill, which followed through on that preparatory work. There are clear parallels between that work and the way we are working together on these issues now.
It is worth noting that when the CAA was set up it was a pathbreaker for other regulators. The then Minister for Trade, Michael Noble, said, on introducing the Bill, that the CAA would be a “constitutional innovation.” He went on:
“The key point perhaps is that we are in this Bill hiving off a regulatory function. Ministers remain responsible to Parliament for policy, but detailed decision rests with the Authority.”—[Official Report, 29 March 1971; Vol. 814, c. 1173.]
That was new then, but we have since seen the development of regulators in many different contexts. The challenge between ministerial and parliamentary responsibility and expert opinion remains with us today and is core to this Bill.
A very positive development, in contrast with what we saw in the late 1960s and early 1970s, was the fact that the Pilling review of the Civil Aviation Authority was brought about by elected colleagues on the Transport Committee rather than by ministerial decision. That report was published in July 2008 and was followed up by Labour Ministers in the previous Government in a statement to the House and then in a consultation paper. The fact that that all came as a result of the Select Committee is new and is very much to be welcomed. When the previous Government engendered the proposals, the then Minister noted that
“as now, the CAA will only be able to act where it is reasonable and proportionate and where it has legal power to act.”
However, the CAA responded:
“The DfT’s proposals build on many activities already undertaken by the CAA, but give them a clear statutory basis”.
The then Minister did not explicitly accept that the CAA had been operating beyond its statutory remit, but the Bill is long overdue, as it will bring clarity to what the CAA does, and make sure that that is Parliament’s intention.
Steve Baker
Does my hon. Friend share my slight concern that more flexible regulation may result in greater uncertainty in major capital investments in airports? Has he considered whether the CAA will be able to provide the stability that investors need?
Mark Reckless
Our right hon. Friend the Prime Minister set out three clear principles on quangos and cases in which they might be justified. Conservatives are strongly against unaccountable quangos, but the three scenarios that the Prime Minister set out were, first, a precise technical function that needed to be performed to fulfil a ministerial mandate; secondly, a requirement for politically impartial decisions on public money in particular circumstances; and, thirdly, cases in which the facts needed to be transparently determined. The CAA fulfils the need for a precise technical function to be performed to fulfil a ministerial mandate.
I welcome the Bill. Although, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wycombe (Steve Baker) said, it provides more flexibility, it engenders far greater clarity. To date—and we have given this to the CAA—the authority has had four different objectives, but there is a lack of clarity about their order, so, inevitably, it has great discretion in how it chooses to balance those potentially competing objectives.
In the Bill, under the single duty that the Government propose giving to the CAA for consumers and their interests, it is much clearer where the authority is going. Regulation, while more flexible, should none the less be more predictable to people in the industry and to other stakeholders. That is broadly welcome. The same applies to appeals. If anyone is dissatisfied with a CAA decision, the only recourse is simply judicial review and the application of Wednesbury principles as to whether the decision has been properly made. The appeal process in the Bill is much improved, because a specialist competition tribunal will be introduced, and it will look at the objectives that have been set for the CAA by Parliament. It will assess in an expert yet judicial way whether or not they have been properly met. Ministers are not persuaded that there should be a right of appeal for the Secretary of State on licence conditions, but when regulations are extended to price cap anew or to remove a price cap, the Secretary of State may have the right to appeal. It is not clear from the explanatory notes whether that reflects the EU dimension or whether Ministers genuinely believe that that is a positive measure.
The cap application is significant. Manchester was de-designated, and Ministers made that decision—a statutory order was made—but the principles behind that de-designation were not clear, making investment difficult in some circumstances for the aviation industry. If we have a clear parliamentary test of when a price cap is needed, that should provide greater clarity for industry participants.
It would be difficult to have an environmental objective and a consumer objective, then look to an independent regulator to balance the two. The right approach for the greenest Government ever is for Ministers to make those decisions and to set a clear framework, whether in taxation or planning, for industry. That is the best way to balance those objectives.
A key issue is flexibility, and flexibility in the price cap is particularly valuable. The CAA currently has an opportunity to set the price cap only once every five years, and when circumstances change the price regime can be left looking inappropriate, but nothing can be done about it. For example, the CAA’s decision notice, published in March 2008, states that
“at Heathrow, the CAA has built into the price caps contingent funding for the costs of developing further”—
during the five-year period—
“the option to expand the capacity of the airport.”
The House of Commons Library has confirmed that that was a reference to the potential third runway at Heathrow, which of course did not happen and—Ministers are very clear—will not happen. None the less, Heathrow is still to be regulated on the basis of an RPI plus 7.5% a year increase in the overall landing charge revenue, but there is no opportunity to review that in the light of the decision not to develop a third runway at Heathrow.
The shadow Secretary of State, if I heard her correctly, said that the Government have a blanket ban on expansion at airports in the south-east. I believe that that is quite wrong. Look at what Luton airport is doing through its road show and expansion in capacity or, as my hon. Friend the Member for Witham explained, what Southend airport is doing. Last week I met representatives of Birmingham airport, who talked about expanding by 25 million passenger movements, the vast bulk of which would relieve pressure in the south-east. At Gatwick a significant increase in capacity is planned, even before the second runway restriction runs out in 2019.
The key criterion is the benefit to consumers of the regulation. However, there is something about aviation regulation that makes it different from other regulation, because in the middle there are the airlines. Sometimes their interests are the same as the consumer’s, but other times they are not. The landing charge at Heathrow is perhaps only £16 a passenger, compared with £50 to £80 for “Boris island”, and £16 or thereabouts is really not expensive. Given the economic benefits of using Heathrow, a huge amount of the benefit accrues to the airlines that happen to have slots there. The regulation in those slots is imperfect and has developed over time, but were the regulator to increase charges at Heathrow, it is not immediately obvious to me, as an economist, whether that would be passed on to consumers in the usual way. To the extent that Heathrow is almost at capacity and landing charges are so low, despite the high value of a slot, an economic analysis suggests that lower restrictions on landing charges might lead to a lower slot price and greater flexibility for the efficient allocation of slots, rather than that necessarily being passed on to the consumer. How the CAA will regulate this is therefore an important area of principle to consider.
The chairman, deputy chairman and non-executive directors of the CAA will be appointed by the Secretary of State, which is very sensible. It is difficult to see why the Secretary of State would also want to appoint all the executives, let alone determine their precise remuneration. We want to ensure proper accountability to Parliament. Some colleagues have mentioned the National Audit Office. I understand that the chief executive would be signed off by the Secretary of State as well, although the nomination would be made by the non-executive directors. I also hope that we would have appropriate parliamentary scrutiny of those appointments.
I am grateful to colleagues on the Transport Committee for the work they have done on this. It is excellent that everyone is working together and I look forward to hearing the Minister’s comments. It is certainly a strong positive for the regulation of the sector in this country.