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Mr. Jamieson: My hon. Friend is right. We appreciate the work that has been carried out by the University of Loughborough, which has helped to inform much of our policy making in this area. We are not creating competition for the motorway service areas; this provision complements, and is not meant to supplant, the work that they do. The hon. Member for Christchurch said that it costs about £25 million to provide a site. I think that I pay a large chunk of that every time I buy a cup of tea or coffee in one of them. The prices are generally high because of the facilities that they have to operate 24 hours a day.
How they are going to be operated is a matter for further discussion. We were asked about France. Yes, we have been talking with the French ministry of transport on the operation and costs of running the aires. The hon. Member for Taunton and the right hon. Member for East Yorkshire raised the running costs. We anticipate that the annual running and maintenance costs will be about £300,000 a year. That will be borne by the taxpayer. The toilets will be cleaned regularly. There will be a presence on the sites some of the time. The managing agents of the motorway, who are regularly patrolling for other reasons, will be calling in. We could have CCTV and so on to make sure that the sites are not being abused.
Mr. Chope: Does the Minister agree that one of the reasons that the costs of these service areas have gone up so much is because prior to 1992 they could be built on seven or eight acres of land, but since 1992 it has been a requirement that the minimum land take should 25 acres? Can he tell us what size land-take he has in mind for these picnic areas?
Mr. Jamieson: The picnic areas will be substantially smaller than that. An area of about 4 or 5 acres might be more appropriate. We have not made a final decision on that, but that is the sort of figure that we have in mind. The picnic areas are not going to be huge or expansive, but they will be appropriate for light use for short periods by people who want to pull in.
Mr. Knight: Before the Minister concludes his remarks, I hope that he will refer to the regulation that covers motorway service areas. Is he intending to address that issue? The reason that he pays so much for his cup of coffee is, as I understand it, that motorway service areas have to keep all their facilities open for 24 hours a day, even in quiet periods. Why are they not allowed to shut down part of their facilities at known quiet periods? That would result in a saving of staff costs.
Mr. Jamieson: We are supposed to be discussing picnic areas, but find ourselves discussing motorway service areas. I do not want to stray into that too much. We have been considering that issue closely with the motorway service area operators, the RAC and the AA. As yet, we have not made any further decisions.
I was asked about planning consents. The motorway service areas will be subject to the usual planning consents that anything that we implement on the side of the road is subject to.
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Yes, the motorway service area operators have been consulted. Originally they did not regard themselves as having too many problems. I think that they have since had a rethink. Where motorway service areas already have picnic areas attached to them, there would be no intention to put one close to that.
The hon. Member for Taunton will appreciate that, particularly in the west country, there is at times a heavy load of holiday traffic on the motorway. With the economy in this country doing so well, many people are taking short breaks or summer holidays and travelling to Cornwall and Devon to enjoy the wonderful countryside and the sea. More people are travelling, so we need alternatives to motorway service areas where people can stretch their legs, get the children out of the car and run the dog for a few minutes. It will be a small but important addition to road safety.
Mr. Flook: The Minister—a Devon MP—once again referred to the west country without mentioning Somerset. My real point is about the service stations, such as they are. Has a detailed report, or any report, been commissioned as to where there is a need for these areas? Does a report exist?
Mr. Jamieson: Once the Bill is through Parliament we will consider that carefully. I did not mention Dorset, Avon or Wiltshire either, but there we are. There has been particular growth of traffic because of the need for tourists in those areas and for economic reasons. The clause is an excellent little one and will be welcomed by motorists in the years to come.
Mr. Chope: I do not often call the Minister complacent because I think that he takes the issue of road safety seriously, as do most members of the Committee. However, on this issue he has a bit of a blind spot. I do not know whether he received the letter from RoadChef that all other members of the Committee received. On 7 January 2005, RoadChef said,
''We are concerned that this legislation has been put forward without any consultation or notification to motorway service area operators.''
I do not know whether that was a figment of RoadChef's imagination, but that was what it said on 7 January. RoadChef is the third largest motorway service area operator in the country, trading from 20 sites and representing about one quarter of the market. It is its view that the establishment of unmanned picnic sites is unlikely to help reduce the number of deaths associated with fatigue on journeys at night, as drivers will be reluctant to stop at sites where refreshments such as coffee are unavailable. The Minister has not addressed that issue.
The Minister has also not addressed the issue as to why, if there is an obligation on motorway service area providers to provide existing rest areas for no charge on their existing sites, it is impossible to give them an option. We could say to them, ''We need to build some smaller picnic areas in the vicinity of your motorway service area and we will give you the first option to
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develop those areas. We will have a competitive tender to see which bid will result in the least cost to the taxpayer.''
We are talking about people who have built up an enormous amount of expertise and experience in providing and looking after motorway service areas and all the Government are talking about is having a few picnic areas on sites that unspecified at the moment and on which people will not be doing any selling or providing any refreshments. That is different even from the sites on trunk roads, to which the Minister referred earlier, where there are often facilities—perhaps a caravan—where somebody can sell people a cup of coffee.
In the light of the research from the Institute of Advanced Motorists, clause 40 is not an answer to the serious problem of road safety. We hope that following this debate the Minister will consult the motorway services operators and come up with a better solution to this real problem.
Question put and agreed to.
Clause 40, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause 41 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Schedule 5
Drivers' hours: enforcement
Mr. Jamieson: I beg to move amendment No. 34, in schedule 5, page 102, line 9, leave out 'vehicle' and insert 'premises'.
This amendment corrects a typographical error.
Amendment agreed to.
Amendment made: No. 63, in schedule 5, page 104, line 23, after 'section', insert
'consisting otherwise than in permitting an act or omission'.—[Mr. Jamieson]
5.58 pm
Sitting suspended for a Division in the House.
6.30 pm
On resuming—
Amendments made:
No. 64, in schedule 5, page 104, line 27, leave out from 'both' to end of line 30 and insert—
'(5) A person guilty of an offence under subsection (1) or (3) of this section consisting in permitting an act or omission is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale.'.
No. 65, in schedule 5, page 104, line 48, leave out from 'exceeding' to end of line 1 on page 105 and insert
'level 5 on the standard scale.'.
Question proposed, That this schedule, as amended, be the fifth schedule to the Bill.
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Mr. Knight: May I ask whether there is any restriction on what a driver does in his own time after driving? If a driver gets to the maximum permitted hours after which he is supposed to take a rest period and drives, but not in connection with his work, so it is not recorded by a tachograph, does he commit an offence?
Mr. Jamieson: As I understand it, he does not. We would expect a driver who had been driving the requisite number of miles to take a break by having a meal, or a nap. We would not want to prevent someone from taking a short journey home in their car because it would not be part of their working time, as covered by the directive. It would, however, be a matter of concern if someone was driving three or four hours after they had done their professional driving.
Question put and agreed to.
Schedule 5, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 42
Vehicles modified to run on fuel stored under pressure
Question proposed, That the clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill.
Mr. Chope: Liquefied petroleum gas has become a very fashionable fuel. Those who have had their vehicles converted to run on LPG might be slightly concerned to read about the explosions that can result from unsatisfactory conversions. The Government's remedy is a testing regime for such adaptations
An alternative might be to ensure that those who perform the adaptations are qualified in accordance with a Government standard. Will the Minister explain the Government's approach? People will have their vehicles converted by someone whom they believe to be a reputable converter, and have them inspected by one of the new Government-appointed inspectors. The inspectors—especially those with a commercial interest in carrying out modifications—might have a motive for saying that the work had not been done properly and that something should be done to modify it. That will add cost and delay for people who wish to have their vehicles converted to LPG.
The initial idea was that the Government should offer people incentives to convert their vehicles to LPG, and it is expected that there will be as many as 100,000 LPG-powered vehicles on our roads by the end of the decade. If so, that will be a useful contribution to the environment, but I am not sure that the Government's solution will encourage people to convert to LPG; indeed, it might have the opposite effect.
If, as the notes on clauses and the regulatory impact assessment make clear, vehicles that have been modified to run on LPG, but have not been modified adequately, are a danger on the roads, how can we be sure that foreign vehicles that have been so modified are not on our roads and a danger to other road users?
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