Schedule
2
Minor
and consequential
amendments
Gillian
Merron:
I beg to move amendment No. 1, in
schedule 2, page 13, line 22, at
end insert—
‘1A In
section 98 (travel concession schemes: further provisions with respect
to participation notices), after subsection (4)
insert—
“(4A) But if the
participation notice was served on the person by one or more
authorities in England
only—
(a) subsection (3)
above shall have effect as if for “twenty-eight days beginning
with the date of the participation notice” there were
substituted “fifty-six days beginning with the date provided for
in relation to the participation notice by virtue of section 97(5)(a)
above”; and
(b)
subsection (4) above shall have effect as if for paragraph (a) there
were
substituted—
“(a)
if the person is required by the participation notice to give a
prescribed number of days’ notice (or, if no number of days is
prescribed, seven days’ notice), at least that number of days
before the date of the notice given to the Secretary of State under
subsection (3) above;
or”.”’.
The
amendment moves our discussion on to the important issue of the
deadline that applies for operators wishing to appeal to the Secretary
of State
against local authority concessionary travel reimbursement arrangements.
As I explained in my letter to members of the Committee on 23 May, Lord
Bradshaw raised the issue of the appeals deadline in the other place.
The deadline is 28 days from new or varied reimbursement arrangements
taking effect, and he suggested that that was not sufficient time for
operators to make an evidence-based decision on whether to submit an
appeal to the Secretary of State. Lord Bradshaw’s
amendment on Third Reading on 5 February extended the deadline
by which bus operators could appeal to the Secretary of State against
English local authority reimbursement arrangements under the Transport
Act 2000 from 28 days to 56 days from the time new or varied
reimbursement arrangements come into
force.
Lord Davies of
Oldham, for the Government, responded favourably to the amendment on
the grounds that provision of extra time should offer scope for the
full gathering of high-quality data. That would mean that any appeals
that operators felt compelled to make would be more firmly grounded in
empirical evidence. It should also help reduce some of the uncertainty
that local authorities might otherwise face from more speculative
appeals.
On Third
Reading, Lord Bradshaw tabled a second amendment on the issue to make
changes to the Transport Act 1985, but in the event, it was not moved.
Amendment No. 1 brings back the principle behind that second amendment.
Under the current arrangements regarding local authority travel
concession schemes, under the Transport Act 1985, an authority
running a local scheme can serve an operator with a participation
notice, which requires the recipient to participate in the scheme. The
operator can appeal to the Secretary of State against that, and the
deadline for the appeal is currently 28 days from the date of the
participation
notice.
I hope that
the Committee will accept that the amendment would largely mirror the
changes already made to the Transport Act 2000 by virtue of
clauses 3(4) to 3(6), by extending the appeal deadline to 56 days from
the date the operator’s obligation to participate in the scheme
would start. That would help to align the provisions for appeals under
the two concessionary legislative regimes. As appeals under both sets
of legislation are, in practice, often made jointly by operators, the
proposed changes to the 1985 Act would help to facilitate the
practice.
The last
part of the amendment would make a connected change. At the moment, an
operator intending to appeal against a participation notice must give
the authority notice of his intention to do so, either before the
operator appeals or, if the participation notice requires it, before
the end of a period specified in the notice. Regulations provide that
that period cannot exceed seven days. That provision, which allows a
local authority to specify that operators must give the authority
notice of their intention to appeal within seven days, undermines the
purpose of extending the appeals period and negates the benefits of
giving operators more time to get the data and so on before
appealing.
The
amendment tackles that problem by providing in effect that the local
authority can specify that the operator must give seven days’
notice, or such other
period as may be specified in regulations, before they can lodge an
appeal. In other words, operators can give notice of an appeal at any
time before they lodge the appeal, except in cases when a local
authority specifies that it would like seven days’ notice, or
any such other time as may be specified in regulations, when at least
that notice must be given. The amendment would only apply in England. I
hope that hon. Members can see the benefits that it will bring and will
support
it.
Stephen
Hammond:
For my part, I can see the benefit of the
amendment and I am grateful for the letter of explanation that we all
received dated 23 May. There is one point, however, that I want to
raise, on which I hope that the Minister will reflect. It is the
illogic of what she has just argued considering the rejection of my
amendment No. 19. If we were to change the wording of her letter to
read “an authority running a local scheme can serve an operator
with a participation notice”, TFL, running a local scheme, would
be able to serve a London borough with a participation notice, yet in
London there would be no possibility of appeal. We have just gone
through that. The Minister accepted that my amendment, which would have
given the London boroughs some appeal process, did not in any way
affect the minimum guarantee. Although the amendment brings some
consistency and order to the Bill, it highlights yet again the
completely iniquitous state that London boroughs are left
in.
Paul
Rowen:
I thank the Minister for the amendment. I know that
my noble Friend Lord Bradshaw attempted to extend the period to 56
days. The amendment tidies up his amendment and will allow, as the
Minister says, proper data to be available from which decisions can be
made. The point was made in the other place that 28 days was
insufficient time, and I welcome the fact that the Minister has agreed
to that.
Amendment
agreed to.
Schedule
2, as
amended,
agreed to.
Schedule 3
agreed
to.
Clause
s
14 and 15
ordered to stand part of the
Bill.
Clause
16
Short
title
Amendment
made: No. 2, in clause 16, page 11, line 17, leave out
subsection (2).—[Gillian
Merron.]
Clause
16, as amended,
ordered to stand part of the
Bill.
New Clause
3
Concessionary
Bus Fares Council
‘(1) There
shall be a Concessionary Bus Fares
Council.
(2) The Concessionary
Bus Fares Council shall
comprise—
(a)
representatives from passenger user
groups,
(b) representatives
from local authorities,
(c)
representatives from the Department for Transport,
and
(d) such other persons as
the Secretary of State thinks fit.
(3) The Concessionary Bus Fares Council shall
undertake the following
functions—
(a)
determining a framework for eligible
services,
(b) determining a
pricing framework for the reimbursement of
operators,
(c) overseeing the
introduction of any national smart card
scheme,
(d) undertaking other
roles as determined by the Secretary of
State.
(4) Before performing
the functions set out in subsection (3) the Concessionary Bus Fares
Council shall
consult—
(a) the
Secretary of State,
(b) local
authorities,
(c)
operators,
(d) passenger
groups, and
(e) such other
persons as the council sees fit.’.—[Paul
Rowen.]
Brought
up, and read the First
time.
Paul
Rowen:
I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second
time.
Earlier, under
clause 8, the Secretary of State gave herself powers to introduce the
national scheme and clause 9 contains provisions on how the variation
for reimbursement and administrative arrangements will operate under
the current scheme. On Second Reading I think that the Secretary of
State quoted a figure of around 215 local councils or transport
authorities that will have responsibility for introducing and running
the scheme. New clause 3 would provide a framework, rather than impose
national arrangements, within which negotiations for the introduction
of a local scheme could operate.
It is obvious to most hon.
Members that within many authorities the five big bus companies
probably run and operate a large number of the services provided. A
considerable administrative and bureaucratic burden will be imposed on
individual councils or passenger transport authorities entering into an
arrangement on the operation of the scheme in their local authority.
New clause 3 would provide a framework for the basic outline of the
scheme to be agreed nationally. I know that the Secretary of State has
asked a number of working parties to work on parts of the Bill and that
they have sought to bring about agreement on how it might operate. The
statutory framework via which such negotiations could take place would
be provided by setting up a concessionary bus fares council. The bus
council would include representatives from user groups, local
authorities, the Department for Transport and anyone else that the
Secretary of State considers appropriate, which would obviously include
the operators. That would allow us to reach some agreement and would
save an awful lot of duplication as a result of individual arrangements
having to be negotiated.
On Second Reading many hon.
Members referred to how schemes had operated in their locality and the
ways in which operators who had not been happy with the agreed scheme
in a particular authority had then successfully appealed to the
Secretary of State. For example, in the case of Greater Manchester,
that then imposed an additional cost of £3.5 million
this
financial year on the passenger transport authority. If we could agree
to establish a concessionary bus fares council, an appeal and
subsequently the imposition of an additional charge on council tax
payers would be unnecessary because agreement would have been reached
between the operators, the users and the councils responsible for
operating the scheme on how the broad framework of services would
operate. As I have
said, the new clause would not remove the right of individual local
authorities to negotiate enhancements and departures, but it would
provide an overall framework. Given the Minister has said that we will
have an ITSO compliant scheme and a national database, a concessionary
bus fares council would provide the framework within which those
discussions could take place. That would not detract from the work of
the Department; rather it would reflect the views of some of the user
groups and working groups that are currently meeting to discuss the
Bill and provide a statutory framework within which they could
operate.
I hope that
the Minister will agree to the new clause because it is genuinely an
attempt to strengthen the Bill. There are no additional costs attached
to the provision; indeed, it would probably save money because it would
reduce the duplication that local authorities will have to engage in if
they each have to negotiate a framework for their own scheme. I hope
that she will agree to the new clause because it would place processes
in the Bill that are already happening anyway. It would strengthen
those processes and provide everyone with a framework within which to
operate.
Gillian
Merron:
I am slightly perplexed by the intentions behind
the new clause because it almost replicates the existing concessionary
fares working group, although it attempts to put the group on a
statutory basis. I believe that the hon. Gentleman’s comments
indicate that the intention is to formalise the consultative
arrangements between the Department, local authorities, operators and
user groups. If that is the case, I would have to ask hon. Members to
cite specific
examples.
5pm
Sitting
suspended for a Division in the
House.
5.15 pm
On
resuming—
Gillian
Merron:
The point I was making before the Division was
that, if the new clause’s intention is to formalise the
consultative arrangements, I must ask the hon. Member for Rochdale to
cite the specific reasons why the arrangements need changing, and why,
presumably, they are not working effectively. The concessionary fares
working group involves representatives from all tiers of local
government—PTEs, London Councils, district, county and unitary
councils, the Local Government Association, operator representatives
from the Confederation of Passenger Transport, the Government offices
for the regions and
the Department itself. The group has been meeting monthly for almost a
year, and it met regularly before that time.
Hon. Members might also wish to
know that several sub-groups of the working group provide advice on
particular issues. For example, the operations and technology sub-group
is considering, among other issues, the technical specification of the
proposed national passes. It has met once a fortnight for many months.
Funding and reimbursement sub-groups have recently been re-established,
and we are organising a workshop with local authority representatives
to focus on eligibility.
I welcome the important work
that the concessionary fares working group and its sub-groups have put
into considering concessionary bus travel matters over the past two
years, both in advance of the changes that were introduced in April
2006, and in preparation for the implementation of the proposed
national concession in England later next year. The working group plays
a vital role in driving the implementation forward, and I put on record
once again my appreciation of its efforts and involvement.
Similarly, user group
representatives—pensioners and disabled people—play an
important role in keeping the Department informed about issues that
concern them as concessionaires. I recently attended a meeting of the
stakeholder group, and I welcome the opportunity to hear from people
who will benefit first hand. Engagement will continue, especially as we
prepare to communicate to potential users the key messages about the
national concession.
We should remind ourselves that
the Department relies not only on informal consultation. For example,
we have just begun formal consultation on the design and
technical specifications of the national concessionary pass. The
consultation is open until 20 July, and to the public as a
whole.
I return to
the purpose of the new clause. From a recent and informal canvass of
members of the concessionary fares working group, there is little
appetite for putting it on a statutory footing. I was happy to hear
that result, because such action would increase bureaucracy and reduce
the flexibility of the group to respond to changing circumstances, and
I am not at all clear about the added value. Would council
recommendations be binding? If so, how would they be enforced? If not,
how would they be useful? How many members would the council have? How
would they be chosen? What would be the decision-making procedure? How
would it be administered? Who would fund it? And how exactly would it
help all parties to implement the national concession successfully next
year?
Paul
Rowen:
Will the concessionary fares working group continue
after the legislation has been implemented?
Gillian
Merron:
Yes, it certainly will. As I believe I said on the
Floor of the House, in April 2008 we will assign dedicated people in
the Department to assist local authorities with any administrative
difficulties that they might have. Not only will we have continuity
beyond April 2008, which is important, but we will make available extra
support. I do not doubt that the
hon. Gentleman’s intentions are good, but setting up a statutory
concessionary bus fares council could have a negative effect, by taking
up valuable time and resources at precisely the wrong moment.
We will of course examine the
forward role of the concessionary fares working group. To put a more
positive slant on local authority assistance, I should point out that
it is already available. The Department is providing local authorities
with clear, dedicated resources to ensure that the measures work for
the benefit of their communities. Bearing all that in mind, I urge
reconsideration of the need for such a statutory body. I hope that the
hon. Gentleman will withdraw his new
clause.
Paul
Rowen:
In view of what the Minister said about the ongoing
role of the non-statutory voluntary group, which appears to be the same
as the role that I envisaged for the concessionary bus fares council, I
beg to ask leave to withdraw the
motion.
Motion and
clause, by leave,
withdrawn.
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