Crossrail Bill


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Clause 61

Service of documents
Stephen Hammond: I beg to move amendment No. 72, in clause 61, page 36, line 33, after ‘by’, insert ‘registered’.
The Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment No. 73, in clause 61, page 37, line 3, after ‘office’, insert
‘or the office of its legal representative’.
Stephen Hammond: Amendment No. 72 is very simple and needs little explanation. It would merely require documents that are to be served under the Crossrail Act to be sent by registered post. As the Committee will be aware, a registered item of mail is recorded in a register when it moves from a local post office, through the sorting office and on to its final destination. It incurs a small extra cost and provides the added comfort that the item’s location can be tracked through the postal system. Those of us who have just experienced the circumstances of October, including many of my constituents, will understand that, if the document is important, that protection would be not only relevant, but appropriate. It is a small measure that would ensure that the Secretary of State’s documents get to the people concerned, and the excuse that mail got lost in the post would not apply. I therefore hope that the amendment will find the Minister’s favour.
I will not spend long talking about amendment No. 73, whose purpose is to fill a small gap in the clause. The clause states that, for non-UK businesses, documents will be delivered to the company’s
“principal office within the United Kingdom.”
All I am suggesting is that there may be a situation in which the company in question does not have an office in this country. The amendment provides that the documents by delivered to the company’s legal representative in the UK and fills a minor gap. I will not press amendment No. 73 but I am interested to see why the Minister feels unable to accept amendment No. 72, if indeed that is his desire.
Mr. Harris: The clause deals with the service of documents under the Bill. Its purpose is to set out how notices under the Bill should be served. Amendment No. 72 would require that any document served under the Bill by way of the postal system should be delivered by registered post. It is important to realise that that would apply to any person serving a notice, whether they were the Secretary of State, the nominated undertaker or any other member of the public serving a counter-notice. A number of provisions provide for other parties to serve notice on the nominated undertaker, and the amendment would require such notices to be served by registered post. Using some method of registered post might be sensible in some cases. It is in the interest of the person serving the notice to ensure that it reaches the intended recipient, as the person serving the notice would be disadvantaged if, in the event of a dispute, they could not later demonstrate that the notice had been properly served. The hon. Gentleman was right to point that out.
Registered post is more expensive than regular post and cost may be a consideration in some cases—presumably not for the Secretary of State, but possibly for private individuals. The person concerned should decide how they wish to proceed, bearing in mind that it may later be a matter of dispute before a court or other judicial body.
I am instinctively opposed to any measure that might incur the accusation of ushering in a nanny state, and I would have thought that a legislator prescribing the method of post that an individual should use to serve any particular notice is perilously close to territory that might lead the Daily Mail to take issue. That does not concern me, but it might concern Opposition Members.
Amendment No. 73 would allow documents to be served on legal representatives rather than a business partnership. However, clause 61(4) already allows the person on whom a notice would otherwise be served to specify an alternative address to which documents should be served. That allows a person to ask for notices to be served to the office of the legal representative if they so wish. I therefore consider the amendments unnecessary, and I hope that the hon. Gentleman will consider withdrawing the amendment.
Stephen Hammond: It is quite amusing for Opposition Members to hear strictures about the nanny state. If the Minister follows that through, I look forward to his joining us more often in the Lobbies to vote against the provisions proposed by his Government. I think that the Daily Mail would rather like the amendment. It gives protection to the small person and allows them to know with absolute certainty that what is being served will reach its destination.
Mr. Harris: Does the hon. Gentleman believe that any member of the public who is in a position where he or she has to serve notice in such a way will not understand what registered post is or the postal options available? Does he believe that we need to put instructions in the Bill about which envelope to use?
Stephen Hammond: I know that most of my constituents will not have that problem, so I will not be tempted down that route. We have all seen problems with the postal system and we have all lost important documents. I certainly have lost important documents in the postal system with no method of tracking them. I do not see that this minor technical change does anything other than add to the Bill. I am not tempted to withdraw the amendment and want to test the Committee’s will and press it to a vote.
Question put, That the amendment be made:—
The Committee divided: Ayes 5, Noes 8.
Division No. 6 ]
AYES
Binley, Mr. Brian
Field, Mr. Mark
Hammond, Stephen
Scott, Mr. Lee
Wright, Jeremy
NOES
Barlow, Ms Celia
Cruddas, Jon
Harris, Mr. Tom
Mahmood, Mr. Khalid
Snelgrove, Anne
Soulsby, Sir Peter
Tami, Mark
Watson, Mr. Tom
Question accordingly negatived.
Clause 61 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 62

Arbitration
Stephen Hammond: I beg to move amendment No. 74, in clause 62, page 37, line 39, leave out subsection (5).
The clause is important because it deals with the process of arbitration and, in essence, it is a strong clause although hon. Members will have detected from my remarks throughout the Committee that I would like it to apply more widely.
The amendment would omit subsection (5) as I fail to see what it would add. It allows the Secretaries of State for Transport and for Communities and Local Government to combine to issue rules about the procedures that govern the process of arbitration.
The system for appointing an arbitrator is already set out clearly in the clause and I would have thought that the detailed rules of engagement should thereafter should be left to the arbitrator. If the Government intervene, it could be problematic; one of the parties to the dispute, namely the nominated undertaker, is an appointee of the Secretary of State and the others could be the Secretaries of State. How would the other party react if they knew that the adversary was writing the rule book?
I invite the Minister to clarify exactly why he thinks the Secretaries of State need the powers that I believe could, yet again, jeopardise the independence of the arbitration process, which other than that seems to be robust and appropriate.
Mr. Harris: The Bill contains provisions for various matters to be referred to arbitration. For example, if the parties agree, disputes with highway authorities under schedule 3 and with various statutory undertakers under schedule 16 can be referred to arbitration. Subsection (5) allows the Secretaries of State for Communities and Local Government and for Transport acting jointly to make the rules governing such arbitration. The hon. Gentleman’s amendment would remove that power.
Subsection (5) follows a similar provision to the Channel Tunnel Rail Link Act 1996. It address the possibility that it may be necessary to have special tailor-made provisions to address the settling of disputes arising under a scheme of the complexity, size and importance of the Crossrail project. Two Secretaries of State will have responsibility for that, rather than just the Secretary of State for Transport, and they will have to ensure that such rules are consistent with the principles of natural justice.
I am not saying that it will not be necessary to make such rules; however, it is important that the Secretaries of State should have the power to do so should it be considered that the need arises. The amendment would remove the power of the Secretaries of State for Communities and Local Government and for Transport to make rules about procedure in relation to arbitration under the Bill. The clause was applied successfully to former Conservative Secretaries of State and it worked extremely well under the Channel Tunnel Rail Link Act 1996. I therefore hope that the hon. Gentleman will seek leave to withdraw the amendment.
5.30 pm
Mr. Field: I cannot think of any circumstances in which the clause could be invoked. Surely, the reality is that if there is arbitration it is because both parties agree to it. If the procedure is in some sense up in the air, and it has to be enforced by Secretaries of State against the will of one or perhaps even both parties, that runs wholly counter to the notion of what arbitration is, and should, do. Arbitration is about parties getting together on the basis that they agree not only on its application but presumably on the procedure for it. That is why my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon thinks that subsection (5) is redundant, and I agree with him. Nothing that the Minister has said has convinced us otherwise. One hopes that the provision will never be invoked, and I suspect that it never will be, because if such a dispute began the parties would not wish to go to arbitration, still less accept an arbitration procedure that was pushed upon them by Secretaries of State.
Mr. Harris: May I clarify the position? The clause does not propose that the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government and the Secretary of State for Transport should determine the result of arbitration; it is about those two Secretaries of State agreeing a procedure for arbitration.
Stephen Hammond: That goes to the nub of what we have discussed several times in our deliberations. The Secretary of State wants to take powers that will enable them to become party to a dispute and seek arbitration, yet at the same time try to affect the arbitration process or even make a judgment in the arbitration.
I have several times tried to convince myself of the validity of the Minister’s explanations, but I struggle even more in relation to this particular clause. My hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster made a telling intervention—it might conflict with other requirements on him but he made it nonetheless. Nothing that the Minister has said has reassured me that the provision is necessary. The Channel Tunnel Rail Link Act—an excellent piece of work by Conservative Secretaries of State—was used as a model for the Bill. However, as has been said, that does not mean that it should be slavishly followed. Consequently, I am not inclined to withdraw the amendment.
Question put, That the amendment be made:—
The Committee divided: Ayes 5, Noes 8.
Division No. 7 ]
AYES
Binley, Mr. Brian
Field, Mr. Mark
Hammond, Stephen
Scott, Mr. Lee
Wright, Jeremy
NOES
Barlow, Ms Celia
Cruddas, Jon
Harris, Mr. Tom
Kramer, Susan
Mahmood, Mr. Khalid
Soulsby, Sir Peter
Tami, Mark
Watson, Mr. Tom
Question accordingly negatived.
Clause 62 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
Clause s 63 and 64 ordered to stand part of the Bill.
 
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Prepared 28 November 2007