APPENDIX 4: CONCESSIONARY BUS TRAVEL BILL
[HL]
Letter from Lord Davies of Oldham to the Chairman.
1. I am writing in response to the Delegated
Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee's Third Report of the Session
and in particular, the section on the Concessionary Bus Travel
Bill. I am most grateful for this.
2. The Committee only mentioned two clauses of
the Bill in detail in its Report - clauses 8 and 9. We welcome
your comments, in particular your consideration that the delegation
in Clause 8 and its level of scrutiny are not inappropriate and
that the delegations in Clause 9 are also not in principle inappropriate.
3. We appreciate your detailed consideration
of clause 9(3)(g) and the concluding observation in paragraph
13 of the Report that it would be "preferable if the bill
specified the matters in respect of which regulations could be
made under clause 9(3)(g) and secured that any regulations made
in exercise of the power conferred by the order must be subject
to a parliamentary procedure". I am pleased to say that I
have today tabled an amendment to provide for this, for consideration
at Lord's Report stage of the Bill. A copy of the amendment is
enclosed for ease of reference [Not printed. The Amendment
appeared as Amendment 24 on the Marshalled List, HL Bill 13-R-I].
4. As you can see, new clause 9(3)(f) now limits
the scope of the regulation-making powers that an order under
clause 9(1)(a) can confer on the Secretary of State. It enables
regulation-making powers to be conferred which correspond or are
similar to the Secretary of State's existing regulation-making
powers in sections 149(3) and 150(6) and (7) of the 2000 Act.
It also includes a sweep-up provision to cater for other matters
of an ancillary nature for which regulations might be needed.
New clause 9(3A) requires any such regulations to be made by statutory
instrument subject to the negative procedure.
5. As the scope of the regulation-making powers
is now more specific, we have also sought to be more
specific about the kind of amendments of the 2000 Act that an
order under clause 9(1)(a) might make by virtue of clause 9(3).
In particular, we hope that the wording at the proposed new clause
9(3)(b), by referring to "altering" (as opposed to removing)
current provisions about appeals will provide reassurance that
there will be an appeal mechanism in future.
6. Finally, I have also today tabled minor, technical
amendments to the Bill which are meant to clarify or improve the
drafting in minor respects, for example by ensuring consistency
with the wording of the Transport Act 2000 and the Greater London
Authority Act 1999.
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