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Earl Attlee: I am grateful for the contributions of all noble Lords who have taken part in the debate, particularly that of the Minister.
The noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, said that multi-agency checks required many different experts. That is of course the point—they are experts. I may have knowledge about vehicle safety, but I am not an expert on animal welfare.
I would not support too many agencies having the power to stop a vehicle on the road. There was always a risk attached to giving VOSA the powers to stop a vehicle on the road, but its vehicles have a distinct livery and commercial vehicle drivers can recognise a VOSA vehicle. If many different agencies were able to stop a goods vehicle that may be carrying a high-value load on the road, we could increase the difficulties associated with hijacking exponentially.
Multi-agency checks are a valuable tool of enforcement. They are an addition to the activities of VOSA in pulling over a vehicle on the road. We must not lose sight of the efficiency of multi-agency checks. Often, when one problem is found with a vehicle or with a driver, there tend to be many more.
I am grateful to the Minister for his kind response. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
[Amendments Nos. 7 and 8 not moved.]
Earl Attlee moved Amendment No. 9:
"ACCREDITATION FOR PURPOSES OF ESCORTING LOADS OF EXCEPTIONAL DIMENSIONS
After section 41 of the Police Reform Act 2002 (c. 30) (accreditation under Community Safety accreditation schemes) insert—
"41A ACCREDITATION FOR PURPOSES OF ESCORTING LOADS OF EXCEPTIONAL DIMENSIONS
(1) This section applies where the Secretary of State is of the opinion that it would be beneficial to ordinary road users for certain members of Her Majesty's Armed Forces to be accredited persons for controlling traffic for the purposes of escorting a load of exceptional dimensions.
(2) The Secretary of State may grant a general accreditation to any person who meets the requirements of subsection (4) below.
(3) Paragraph 9 of Schedule 5. Power to control traffic for purposes of escorting a load of exceptional dimensions shall have effect to persons accredited under this section.
(4) The requirements to be met before the Secretary of State grants accreditation are—
(a) that the person is a member of Her Majesty's Armed Forces and is otherwise a suitable person to exercise the powers that will be conferred upon him by virtue of the accreditation;
(b) that the person is capable of effectively carrying out the functions for the purposes of which those powers are to be conferred on him; and
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(c) that the person has a military trade qualification of either—
(i) a military policeman, or
(ii) a driver of abnormal load carrying vehicle, and
is specially trained and qualified to exercise the powers specified in paragraph 9 of Schedule 5.""
The noble Earl said: With some trepidation, I move Amendment No. 9. I remind the Committee that I am a serving TA officer involved in logistics. The amendment also relates to accreditation under Section 41 of the Police Reform Act 2002. Schedule 5(9) to the Act allows accredited persons to give directions to traffic to facilitate the efficient movement of abnormal loads. I understand that no police force has accredited anyone under paragraph 9 for those purposes, which may have something to do with the way in which the provisions were included in the Police Reform Act.
The same problem of accreditation applies to military personnel as applies to VOSA officials with regard to the need to accredit with every police force. Service personnel who want to escort an abnormal load and use the powers of an accredited person will also have to be accredited with all 40 or so police forces. The reality is that military personnel already stop ordinary traffic and motorists, who would expect the military to have that power. Of course, we know well that they do not. So the reality is no change.
The key part of my amendment is Section 41C, which states that the person must be either a military policeman, who obviously is trained to stop vehicles, or the driver of a heavy equipment—abnormal load—transporter. In both cases, he must be specially trained and qualified. That would provide a better quality control system than would be available from civilian industry. I beg to move.
Lord Davies of Oldham: As I indicated, I was a little less happy with this amendment on what I hope will be recognised by the noble Earl as quite significant grounds. The amendment would, in the main, duplicate provisions in the Police Reform Act 2002 that already provide for accredited persons to be designated with the powers of a police constable to control traffic for the purpose of escorting loads of exceptional dimensions.
There is a certain superfluity about the amendment, but my first real objection is that it would move operational decisions on the suitability of persons to be conferred with police powers from where, I think the House will agree, they are best made; namely, at chief constable level. They would be transferred to the Secretary of State, which is not a wise course of action.
The second problem with the amendment is that it would go far beyond its apparent purposes. I hear what the noble Earl says: members of the public are used on occasions to having defence police direct traffic when a particularly heavy load is being conveyed by Ministry of Defence personnel, which happens rarely. However, I am not sure that the citizens of this country would take too kindly to fixed penalty notices being issued by a
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Ministry of Defence officer or that alcohol or tobacco should be confiscated by him or her. The noble Earl's amendment would confer those powers on such officers.
I know that that is not the noble Earl's intent or, let us say, his interpretation of that intent, which is wholly benign, but it would have that effect, and the Committee will recognise that that is a cause for severe reservation about the amendment. The noble Earl made considerable progress with his earlier amendments, and we want to work on those ideas. However, this is a bad idea, and I hope that he will withdraw his amendment.
Earl Attlee: I never have bad ideas; I have interesting ones. Can the Minister first explain why, since the Police Reform Act was passed in 2002, no one has been accredited for the purposes of paragraph 9 of Schedule 5? No one has become an accredited person for escorting abnormal loads. The police are simply not taking part. Secondly, my amendment refers to paragraph 9 of Schedule 5, which deals with the escorting of abnormal loads. I suspect that that slipped into the Minister's notes because I have tidied up my amendment. The original version may have had that defect, but I took advice from the Clerks, and my amendment is now perfect.
I thank the Minister for his response, and I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 2 [Graduated fixed penalty points]:
Lord Hanningfield moved Amendment No. 10:
"( ) the time of day it was committed,"
The noble Lord said: Clause 2 amends Section 53 of the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988 to enable the Secretary of State to prescribe by order graduated penalties. The amount may vary depending on the circumstances of the offence, which include in particular the nature of the offence; its severity; where it took place; and whether the offender had committed other prescribed offences during a prescribed period. However, the wording of the clause is not restricted, which gives us a chance to question the Government on the thinking behind the criteria set out in paragraphs (a) to (d) and to probe further on why certain factors that they believe are sensible have been left out.
In particular, we are concerned about the use of the phrase, "how serious it is" in paragraph (b) and whether it is sufficiently precise. Who will judge that? How will the judgment be made, and what criteria will apply? I believe that something specific about, say, the number of vulnerable road users and pedestrians in the vicinity at the time would be relevant to assessing the gravity of the offence, as set out in Amendments Nos. 11 and 17. Indeed, our amendments provide some alternative and additional criteria. Amendments Nos. 10 and 16 would add the time of day that an offence is committed because
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often it is a highly relevant factor. Amendments Nos. 12, 13, 18 and 19 are designed to deal with issues that might arise due to weather conditions.
We are in effect probing the Government on whether additional factors should be taken into account and whether, as highlighted in Amendment No. 20, the offender in question has an opportunity to put forward any other information or reason why the offence was committed. In short, we are concerned that, as it stands, the clause may be too rigid to deal with the nature of circumstances that may be beyond the powers of the driver.
The fixed penalty regime has proved convenient for administrators and forces and, on occasion, for the perpetrators of offences. We would all welcome more flexibility in the system. I beg to move.
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