Examination of Witnesses (Questions 80-94)
RT HON.
RUTH KELLY
MP AND MR
ROBERT DEVEREUX
24 OCTOBER 2007
Q80 Mr Hollobone: Constituents of
mine in Kettering and throughout the East Midlands and the eastern
area are concerned about the growing number of foreign lorries
on our roads. It is a particular issue with regard to road safety
which I did not see any mention of on pages 178 and 179 in the
report. The problem pretty clearly is that in foreign lorries
the driver is sitting on the wrong side of the cab. When I spent
some time with Northamptonshire police last year—they are
responsible for the section of the M1 which goes through Northamptonshire—they
were telling me that 70% of the vehicle incidents on the M1 were
due to overtaking manoeuvres by foreign lorries not being able
adequately to see other vehicles on the road. I wondered why this
issue is not important enough to feature in the report and what
steps the department are looking to take to tackle this problem.
Ruth Kelly: I understand that
one of the measures that has been taken by VOSA in the last year
has been a trial of handing out what I understand are called fresnel
lenses which help hauliers, whether they are left or right hand
drives, to look and identify what the potential obstacles or hindrances
are on the road. It has, I understand, also led to a very significant
improvement in safety performance. That is clearly something that
is under current, active consideration by VOSA and they are also
doing more and more enforcement checks, particularly on hauliers
that are involved in international journeys where the evidence
suggests that there are more offences.
Q81 Chairman: The evidence suggests
that enforcement is not happening on foreign lorries and that
large numbers of them, even when they are stopped, escape. I know
the department has made encouraging noises about it but frankly,
since road safety appears to have disappeared out of your targets,
it would be helpful to know that you are committed to rather more
than making encouraging noises.
Mr Devereux: Can I come back to
the point about it not appearing? It is just a question of where
it is. If you look at 11.16 on page 173 you will find references
to the changes that have been made in the Road Safety Act which
do change the powers in respect of this. In respect of what we
are doing about it, you will have seen the PBR of additional resources
for VOSA to do enforcement. That means there will be more of it
than there has been in the past. The observation that it is still
not enough is a point which we perfectly understand and, as we
think about what we do with our spending review settlement, we
need to think harder about it.
Ruth Kelly: The level of enforcement
checks doubled in the last financial year so clearly this is a
current priority for VOSA and, as Mr Devereux has said, we will
have to think very carefully about whether we are investing sufficient.
Q82 Chairman: Secretary of State,
you will be aware that all these schemes that we have been talking
about are dwarfed by the cost of Galileo. Do you have a whole
figure for the cost of Galileo?
Ruth Kelly: I do not have the
figures to hand but clearly there would be potential benefits
to the EU and to the UK.
Q83 Chairman: No. I heard the propaganda.
On page 144 of your report it says, "An EU public private
partnership is being negotiated." That is no longer the case,
is it?
Mr Devereux: Correct.
Ruth Kelly: Correct, yes. We have
come to an end of the process.
Q84 Chairman: Will the British government
actively push for a decision on the future of Galileo to be made
by the European Council of heads of state in December rather than
by qualified majority vote in the Transport and Ecofin Councils?
Ruth Kelly: It is something that
currently should be considered by qualified majority vote because
the increase in the cost, which you have rightly identified, is
not sufficient to take it above the barrier.
Q85 Chairman: We know that, although
are you satisfied that the figures that have been given to you
by the Commission in any way stand up, because we have in this
Committee grave doubts as to the accuracy of the information.
Ruth Kelly: We are certainly pressing
them as hard as we possibly can for a better cost benefit analysis.
Q86 Chairman: You will not agree
that this should be taken by qualified majority vote in the Transport
Council?
Ruth Kelly: What we want to do
is improve the cost benefit analysis and make sure we have sufficient
cost control in the project and sufficient management in the system
so that we deliver something which really is of benefit to Europe.
We remain convinced that, given that this is a European project
which will deliver and can deliver benefits, that is the way forward.
Mr Devereux: My understanding
is that the Commission's proposals at the moment do not add up
without changing the overall way in which the Community is financed.
Q87 Chairman: I think this Committee
would agree with you that the figures proposed do not add up.
Mr Devereux: That being the case,
some fairly significant scrutiny has to be applied to this before
anybody can make a decision on it. We are clearly not in the game
of changing the financial perspectives.
Ruth Kelly: One of the things
that we are arguing is that if there is an increase in cost, which
clearly has been identified, there should be reprioritisation
within the financial perspective rather than the European Union
having to pay more in total as a result.
Q88 Chairman: What are you going
to do if a qualified majority of finance ministers decides to
open up the financial perspective?
Ruth Kelly: We are currently arguing
hard that it should not. We have allies in Germany. I have spoken
to the German Transport Minister about this issue for example.
I think we are making progress but we are arguing that it should
be within the current limit under the ceilings of the financial
perspective, that there should be reprioritisation within it and
that there should be clear cost benefit analysis applied too.
Q89 Chairman: Are there any precedents
to the Financial Perspective of the European Union being reopened
after it has been agreed by heads of state?
Ruth Kelly: I would need to provide
you with letter and verse on that but I understand in exceptional
circumstances it can be.
Q90 Chairman: Would you give us one
page which gives the total real cost, a figure, you know one of
those boring figure bits, what 17% of that would mean to the British
taxpayer, whether or not you are prepared to take action if it
is reopened under Financial Perspectives and whether, indeed,
this decision will be taken by Qualified Majority Vote in the
transport council.
Ruth Kelly: I will certainly supply
you with that information.
Q91 Mr Leech: During your introduction
you said the Department could be economic and green at the same
time. Tackling congestion is obviously economic and green at the
same time, so why is the Government so luke warm towards the national
road user pricing scheme?
Ruth Kelly: I will start with
the big picture here. I completely accept the Eddington analysis
that if we do not do anything congestion is likely to rise by
about 25% over the next ten years. We have choices to make to
deal with that. One would be, as he identified, to roughly times
by five the investment in the roads. We spend about a billion
pounds a year, we would have to spend more than £5 billion
to make inroads into that, and clearly that is not on the agenda
or, Eddington said, we would need to introduce a widespread road
pricing scheme. Now, even he acknowledged that would take many
years to implement even if a decision was taken but what he also
said, and I have read this with interest, was that 88% of current
congestion is in urban areas and 80% of the projected growth in
congestion is in urban areas. What I think the right way forward
is, is using the money identified in the TIF budget—Transport
Innovation Fund—allows local areas which want to do so to
come forward with innovative schemes which would combine significant
investment in public transport with demand management road pricing
measures, back those schemes, see how they develop, have a debate
about how they are developing in public while at the same time
keeping our options open as a Government with investment in R&D,
trialling the technology which might allow us to do something
more sophisticated were we to choose to do that in the future.
At the moment no decisions have been taken on whether there should
be any other form of road pricing.
Q92 Mr Leech: One of the proposed
arguments for having these TIF bids and local schemes being introduced
was that it would be a pilot for a national scheme. Are you seriously
suggesting that a Manchester focused scheme or a Cambridge focused
scheme will give the Government an indication of whether or not
a national scheme can be rolled out?
Ruth Kelly: We have invited the
main urban areas across the country to come forward with bids.
We have currently received bids from Manchester and Cambridge,
as I am sure you are aware, but there is no reason why in future
we might not receive bids from other areas such as the West Midlands.
The priority, it seems to me, in the short-term is to try and
tackle the real congestion problems which exist in the major urban
areas in our cities. If we get that right, if they come forward
with innovative suggestions that we can back as a Government,
and I am not able to comment on the individual bids clearly that
we are considering in this Department, that will in its own right
make a very significant difference.
Q93 Chairman: Secretary of State,
I am sorry to interrupt you. I understand we are very soon going
to have not one vote but four.
Ruth Kelly: Four votes!
Q94 Chairman: I think in those circumstances
it would be difficult for us to continue, however there are large
numbers of questions about train services, about port safety statistics,
various questions on the regions which people would like to ask.
If I adjourn the Committee today will you accept that we will
submit a series of questions to you. If needs be I am going to
ask you to come back.
Ruth Kelly: Of course.
Chairman: I am very grateful to you and
grateful to the Members. I apologise. The Committee is adjourned.
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