| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
5.30 pm
My hon. Friend the Minister remains steadfastly seated. It would be easy enough for him to reply to me in a few words. We are not happy about a twin-track procedure for raising money at the expense of my constituents, and we are not persuaded that there is any reason for it. As my hon. Friend is not tempted by my invitation, I must assume—as my constituents must—that the Government are indeed sanguine about the forcing of the two tax-raising measures on them in circumstances that no one has yet explained. The purpose is not to refurbish the tunnels or to get the authority out of debt, because it is not in debt. It is not even to secure a more sensible way of raising tolls—a fast-track approach. If that were the case, the old procedure would not be needed.
What can my hon. Friend and the promoter point to that will go wrong? In what circumstances will the old system be used? Can someone please tell us what the fallback position is?
As I hope the House appreciates, I am doing my best for my constituents. I have asked the promoter and the Government for answers, but for the moment there is a stony silence. I do not know whether my hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley, North and Sefton, East will serve as official spokesman for the promoter, but he indicated, sotto voce, that he wished to speak. I shall sit down now, but I look forward to elucidation from someone—if not for my benefit, at least as a courtesy to the House.
Mr. George Howarth: I shall try to be brief.
Listening to my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral, West (Stephen Hesford), I was reminded of a line from a song on The Beatles' "Abbey Road". I quote from memory, but I think it ran, "You never give me your pillow, you only issue your invitations". My hon. Friend seems to have issued invitations to everyone rather liberally in the last few moments.
I think that my hon. Friend rather over-egged the pudding. He spoke at some length about the promoter, Merseytravel. I should emphasise that I represent my constituents, and do not directly represent the promoters.
Stephen Hesford: Will my hon. Friend give way?
Mr. Howarth: I have not begun to develop my argument yet.
My hon. Friend says, in effect, that the promoters of the Bill want to take a belt-and-braces approach; as well as the new powers that they seek, they want to reserve the power to continue to use the old system. That is the core of his argument, which I have managed to put in two minutes but which took him 30 minutes.
The simple answer to my hon. Friend's question is that, for all intents and purposes, in all normal circumstances, the promoters intend to use the new system. They want the straightforward power to be able to increase the tunnel tolls in line with inflation, measured by the retail prices index. Whether the increase will be 10p every three years or some other figure will obviously depend on the rate of inflation. However, the promoters want a further option in case
something unforeseen happens. I do not know whether my hon. Friend has any experience in public finance, but in every public finance system that I have dealt with—whether in local government or national Government—provision is always made for unforeseen circumstances. I cannot predict what they might be, but any civil engineering project could go wrong. The circumstances might not be within the control of those responsible for managing the project; for example, there could be an act of terrorism or some engineering fault that was not originally evident. There must be some way of dealing with such eventualities.The promoters have sensibly taken the view that the old arrangement, as my hon. Friend describes it, would be the fair way to deal with such circumstances. There would be a public inquiry. The authority would have to go back to central Government and justify why they wanted to exceed what they had asked for under the initial powers.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mr. Tony McNulty) indicated assent.
Mr. Howarth: I do not want to put words into the Government's mouth, but my hon. Friend is nodding in agreement. I may have saved him from the need to make a speech.
The arrangements that I have described always apply in any public finance system. Unless my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral, West seeks only to make mischief, I do not know why he could not have figured that out for himself.
Mr. Miller: My hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley, North and Sefton, East (Mr. Howarth) has half-answered the question that I was about to put to the sponsor of the Bill, my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby (Mrs. Curtis-Thomas). I, too, spotted the Minister nodding earlier, so that was helpful.
When I added my name to the amendment, it was to enable me to probe the circumstances in which the promoters would make such an application. What are the circumstances in which the Secretary of State might be minded to accede to them?
Mrs. Curtis-Thomas: Will my hon. Friend give way?
Mr. Miller: If my hon. Friend will allow me, I shall finish asking my questions and then I shall welcome her answers.
I have made a particular examination of the reports prepared by the German automobile association—ADAC—on the safety aspects. One can see that there could be exceptional expenditure, as my hon. Friend the Member for Knowsley, North and Sefton, East described. He made a fair point. He also threw up other possibilities, though God forbid that there should be terrorism. I noticed, on a website, that the
- "chairman of tunnel operators Merseytravel, says tolls will have to rise to meet the cost of the revamp"
That led me—I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for Crosby has been considering this, as she is an
engineer by background—to look at some of the engineering issues that have cropped up in previous tunnel incidents. Some awful tragedies have taken place around the world. Thank goodness—and I say, well done—Merseytravel has avoided some of the awful incidents that we have seen.I looked at the ADAC report, at some work done by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology examining damage to concrete walls in the event of fires, and at an extraordinarily detailed report entitled, "The Prevention and Control of Highway Tunnel Fires" published in the United States about three years ago, which went through very detailed evidence surrounding a range of fire situations, and created models of potential fire situations that thus far had not occurred in real life. It is a scary report.
The single question that I should like answered is, am I right that the promoters envisage clause 92 being applied only in circumstances relating to safety? If there are any other circumstances, I want to know; it is a fair question to ask. If it is safety only, I am for keeping clause 92 as it stands. If it is broader and the promoters want to leave it fairly vague, that is not good enough.
Mrs. Curtis-Thomas: I thank my hon. Friend for allowing me to make this intervention. He, like me, will have heard announcements—
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. Is the hon. Lady intervening on the hon. Gentleman?
Mr. Deputy Speaker: In that case, the hon. Lady is actually making a speech.
Mrs. Curtis-Thomas: Given that I am on my feet, perhaps I can address the comment that has just been made. I believe that the exceptional circumstances are unforeseen but would be more than likely to include safety matters.
My hon. Friends will have heard today that the EU intends to formulate a directive on all manufactured chemical products and to determine their impact on members of the public. I was working in the chemical industry when the EU had its first go at that in the mid-1980s. Catastrophic shock waves travelled through the chemical industry as people began to consider the consequences of the general products that had already been produced for the public who were purchasing them. At the time, products that had been on the market for 20 years were exempted from that consideration. It is now proposed to bring all products into the EU directive, so all companies providing products must be able to provide technical appraisals and toxicity appraisals to indicate the impact of those products on the population. I do not know the likely consequences, but I can well imagine that some products that have been used in the construction of the tunnels and other structures might well have an impact on the population that we currently do not assess.
Mr. Miller: I am grateful; that is helpful.
In what circumstances might the clause be used other than to deal with emergency major engineering works that stem from things like the safety case? If there are no other circumstances, that is fine and the provision ought to remain in the Bill. If there are other circumstances, beyond safety, the House is entitled to know of them.
5.45 pm
Mrs. Curtis-Thomas: I cannot foresee any other circumstances in which those powers would need to be used. However, I have worked for 20 years in an industry where unforeseen incidents do unfortunately happen. One still has to have provisions and arrangements that accommodate those exceptional circumstances. If one does not have them in place, one is criticised by the public for failing to do so.
| Next Section
| Index | Home Page |