Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill on 9 September (HL2269), why they cannot mandate the purchase of British-built buses given that funding is being provided by the HM Treasury.

We are prevented from requiring that grant funding should be used to procure ‘British Built’ buses This prohibition is founded in long-standing World Trade Organization (WTO) law and also implements our commitments in the UK-EU Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA).

However, while the Government cannot mandate the purchase of British-built buses, at the final UK Bus Manufacturing Expert Panel, Mayoral Combined Authorities (MCAs) agreed to commit that a 10% minimum of social value criteria would apply in all future bus procurement exercises.  This means that when procuring buses, MCAs will consider the positive impact a manufacturer has on our society, the environment, and on the local community as part of their decision-making process.

UK-based bus manufacturers have benefited the most from the Department’s funding programmes, such as ZEBRA. It is estimated that over 60% of ZEBRA-supported buses will be procured from UK-based manufacturers.