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I am delighted that the noble Earl, Lord Listowel, and many others have welcomed the publication of the Government’s 2020 Children and Young People’s Workforce Strategy. We see this as absolutely crucial, as we need to support the work of social workers. As many noble Lords have identified, there are key concerns; we are putting in £73 million over the next three years for better training, professional development and support
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I have come to the end of my time. I wish to stress again that this has been a very helpful debate. I look forward to working with noble Lords to take the debate further in a considered, intelligent and systematic way.
2.25 pm
Baroness Shephard of Northwold: My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have so expertly contributed to the debate today. It has been an example of the House working at its best. Colleagues have approached the subject from different perspectives, but the degree of consensus has been remarkable. With respect, I suggest that the Minister has not addressed that consensual view in her characteristically full and sincere response. That view, as expressed today, is that it would be timely now to review the principle behind the Children Act 2004—the principle that merging social and education services would be in the best interests of all children. I believe that the view today, as put forward by noble Lords, has been that we should have another look at that. I hope that the Minister might accept the view of her colleagues from all parties in the House today. I beg leave to withdraw the Motion.
Transport: Infrastructure
Statement
2.26 pm
The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Lord Adonis):My Lords, with permission, I shall now repeat a Statement made in another place by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Transport on the Government’s plans for transport infrastructure.
“Effective transport links are vital to our economic competitiveness and our daily lives. Britain's prosperity is increasingly defined by the quality of its links to other great trading nations, by the way in which we move people and goods around the country, and by our ability to meet the needs of businesses for gateways to the global economy and to enable people to see their families and friends and to go on holiday.
As the economic downturn demonstrates, we live in a global age. It is critical that government make the tough choices necessary to deliver long-term prosperity to the United Kingdom, but in a way that meets our environmental objectives. It is in this context of sustainable economic growth that I want to set out a package of transport investments to prepare us for an ever more global and mobile world.
Over the past decade, we have delivered £150 billion investment in transport—more than £13 billion alone this year—and have announced that we will bring forward an extra £1 billion to stimulate the economy by accelerating our plans to cut congestion and significantly increase rail capacity. Over this current three-year period we are spending around £40 billion, ensuring that investment on transport is at its highest level as a proportion of national income for 30 years.
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I should first like to update the House on our plans for road and rail infrastructure, and for carbon dioxide emissions from transport before turning to aviation, and in particular Heathrow. I am placing in the Libraries of both Houses relevant papers setting out the proposals in more detail. Copies will be available in the Vote Office at the conclusion of my Statement and on the department's website.
Motorways are essential for enabling people and goods to move around the country. Successful trials on the M42 have enabled us safely to open up motorway hard shoulders in peak periods, delivering more reliable journey times and adding a third more capacity at peak times, all delivered at a lower cost than a more conventional road-widening scheme. After further detailed work, I can announce today a programme of up to £6 billion, which includes applying these techniques to some of the most congested parts of the M1, M25, M6, M62, the M3 and M4 approaching London, and the motorways around Manchester, Birmingham and Bristol. This is the first step in our strategy to provide for managed motorways across the core of the motorway network, linking our major cities over the next 10 to 15 years, and reducing congestion with fewer environmental impacts than with conventional widening.
On the railways, we are already investing £10 billion over the next five years to add capacity while improving reliability and safety. However, given the time it takes to plan and build new rail infrastructure, we need to look well beyond 2014. Electrification is advantageous on heavily used parts of the rail network. Electric trains are lighter, accelerate faster, are quieter and emit less carbon dioxide. We are well advanced in procuring replacement trains for the intercity routes, but before we finalise our plans, we need to decide whether new parts of the network should be electrified. Initial work suggests that the case for electrification appears strongest on the most heavily used parts of the Great Western main line from Paddington and the Midland main line north of Bedford. Alongside the work on our new intercity trains, we will analyse the value for money, affordability and financing options of the electrification proposals that Network Rail will put to me shortly. I intend to make a further Statement later this year.
Because of the need to plan for the long term, I can also announce that I am today forming a new company—High Speed Two—to consider the case for new high-speed rail services from London to Scotland. As a first stage, we have asked the company to develop a proposal for an entirely new line between London and the West Midlands, which would enable faster journeys to other destinations in the north of England and Scotland using both existing lines and a new high-speed rail network.
Our experience with Crossrail and the Channel Tunnel Rail Link has demonstrated that advance detailed planning is required to progress such major infrastructure schemes. The purpose of the new company will be to advise Ministers on the feasibility and credibility of a new line with specific route options and financing proposals. Sir David Rowlands will chair the company in the interim. I see a strong case for this new line approaching London via a Heathrow international hub station on the Great Western line to provide a
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In the 2003 air transport White Paper, the Government set out their support in principle for a third runway at Heathrow Airport, support that was conditional on any development meeting strict local environmental conditions. Heathrow Airport supports more than 100,000 British jobs. A third runway is forecast to create up to 8,000 new on-site jobs by 2030 and will provide further employment benefits to the surrounding area. Its construction alone would provide up to 60,000 jobs.
More significantly for businesses across the United Kingdom, Heathrow is our only hub airport; it is our most important international gateway. It serves destinations that none of our other airports serves, and it provides more frequent services to key international destinations such as Mumbai and Beijing. It connects us to the growth markets of the future essential for every great trading nation. In doing so, it benefits every region of Britain.
Heathrow is now operating at around 99 per cent of its maximum capacity, leading to delays and constraints on future economic growth. Heathrow is already losing ground to international hub airports in other competitor countries. This makes the UK a progressively less attractive place for mobile international businesses. Delays damage the efficiency of the airport, but they also cause unnecessary carbon dioxide emissions as up to four stacks of aircraft circle London waiting to land. The Government remain convinced, therefore, that additional capacity at Heathrow is critical to this country’s long-term economic prosperity. We consulted in November 2007 on three options for providing additional capacity and on whether the environmental conditions could be met. We received nearly 70,000 replies. I have now considered the responses and reached my conclusions.
Two of the options would use the existing runways for both arrivals and take-offs, known as mixed mode. This would improve resilience, reduce delays and has the potential to provide early additional capacity. It is clear from the consultation, however, that residents under the flight paths greatly value the present alternation of runway operations at around 3 pm, which gives them respite from overhead aircraft noise for at least eight hours each day. Having carefully considered the evidence, including from the consultation, I have decided not to proceed with mixed mode. I have also decided to extend the benefits of runway alternation to those affected by aircraft taking off and landing when the wind is blowing from the east. I will therefore end the Cranford agreement, which generally prohibits easterly take-offs on the northern runway. This will benefit the residents of Windsor and others to the west of the airport and Hatton and North Feltham to the east. I support the continuation of the other operating procedures as set out in the consultation.
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This leaves the question of a third runway. Let me first explain my conclusions in the light of the conditions on noise, air quality and surface access set out in the 2003 White Paper. In 1974, some 2 million people around Heathrow were affected by average levels of noise at or above 57 decibels. By 2002, that number had reduced to 258,000 people as the result of significant improvements in aircraft technology. In the White Paper, the Government committed not to enlarge the area within which average noise exceeded 57 decibels. In the light of all the evidence, including from the consultation, I have decided that this condition can be met, even with a third runway. Indeed, because newer aircraft are quieter, the number of people within the 57 decibel contour by 2020 is expected to fall by a further 15,000 from 2002, even with more aircraft movements in 2020. The number of people affected by higher levels of noise is expected to fall even more significantly; for example, a 68 per cent reduction—more than 20,000 fewer people—in those affected by noise averaging 66 decibels and above.
On air quality, the Government are committed to meeting our EU obligations. The relevant pollutant at Heathrow is nitrogen dioxide, for which the EU has set a 2010 target of an annual average of no more than 40 micrograms per cubic metre. As with most other major European economies, the UK does not yet fully comply with this limit, largely as a result of emissions from motor vehicles. The area around Heathrow is by no means the worst example in the country, and the limit is currently exceeded in a number of places in the UK, in most cases by more than near Heathrow. Meeting EU air quality targets is an issue that must be addressed across the UK, not simply around Heathrow Airport. The European Commission has agreed that member states could be allowed an extension to 2015, if member states can show that they have plans in place to meet the targets. This presents a significant challenge, but I am committed to supporting the actions, mainly in relation to motor vehicle emissions, necessary to achieve it. Immediately around Heathrow, action will be necessary to ensure that we meet the air quality limits by 2015. Our forecasts predict that, in any event, we will be meeting the limits by 2020 even with airport expansion.
Normally these decisions would be taken on the basis of forward projections and modelling. To reinforce our commitments on noise and air quality, I have decided, however, that additional flights could be allowed only when the independent Civil Aviation Authority is satisfied, first, that the noise and air quality conditions have already been met—the air quality limit is already statutory, and we will also give the noise limits legal force—and, secondly, that any additional capacity will not compromise the legal air quality and noise limits. We will give the CAA a new statutory environmental duty to ensure that it acts in the interests of the environment in addition to its existing obligations and duties and that it follows guidance from me, my right honourable friend the Environment Secretary and the Energy and Climate Change Secretary.
Moreover, in the event that air quality or noise limits were breached, the independent regulators will have a legal duty and the necessary powers to take action, or require others to take the action, needed to
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The third local condition for expansion for Heathrow was the provision of adequate public transport. Major improvements in rail access have already been announced, including increases in capacity on the Piccadilly line and the introduction of Crossrail services from 2017. This will provide a maximum capacity of 6,000 passengers per hour, which will be able to accommodate the estimated demand for rail access to a three-runway airport.
The Government also welcome the lead being taken by BAA to promote the Airtrack project providing direct rail access to the airport at Terminal 5 from the south and west. The department will work with BAA and Network Rail to consider this and other schemes to improve connections from Heathrow to places such as Waterloo and Guildford, Reading and other stations on the Great Western main line.
Having considered all the evidence, I have decided that all three of the Government’s conditions for supporting a third runway at Heathrow can be met. I can therefore confirm that an additional terminal and the slightly longer runway proposed in the consultation are the best way to maximise the efficiency of a larger airport.
However, I want there to be a limit on the initial use of the third runway so that the increase in aircraft movements does not exceed 125,000 a year, rather than—at this stage—allowing the full additional 222,000 aircraft movements on which we consulted.
I have also decided that any additional capacity available on the third runway will, after consultation, be subject to a new “green slot” principle, to incentivise the use at Heathrow of the most modern aircraft, with further benefits for air quality and noise and, indeed, carbon dioxide emissions.
It is of course crucial for transport, including aviation, to play its full part in meeting our goal to limit carbon dioxide emissions. As a result of UK leadership on aviation emissions in particular, carbon dioxide emissions from international aviation were included in the EU 20 per cent greenhouse gas reduction target for 2020, agreed by the Prime Minister with other European leaders in December last year.
Under the EU Emissions Trading Scheme, this reduction will occur whether or not Heathrow is expanded. With a fixed cap for aviation across Europe, doing nothing at Heathrow would allow extra capacity at other hub airports such as Frankfurt, Schipol and Charles de Gaulle. Doing nothing will damage our economy and have no impact on climate change.
The framework for reducing emissions across the EU covers international aviation and all sectors of each member state’s domestic economy. This includes emissions from domestic transport within the UK. The Government have already made clear that they will respond to the advice of the Committee on Climate Change on carbon budgets, taking into account aviation, and we will set our carbon budgets later this year.
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These budgets will reflect the measures in the EU 2020 package, such as tough new limits on emissions from new cars. To reinforce the delivery of carbon dioxide savings, and to lay the ground for greater savings beyond 2020, I am announcing today funding of £250 million to promote the take-up, and commercialisation within the UK, of ultra low emission road vehicles. With road transport emissions so much greater than aviation’s, even a relatively modest take-up of electric vehicles beyond 2020 could, on its own, match all the additional carbon dioxide generated by the expansion of Heathrow.
But, action in relation to domestic transport is not sufficient. We need to take the same tough approach to aviation emissions as we are doing in relation to other transport emissions. So, having taken the lead in promoting the inclusion of aviation in the EU Emissions Trading Scheme, the Government will be pressing hard for international aviation to be part of the global deal on climate change at Copenhagen later this year. I have asked the Committee on Climate Change to report back later this year on the best way in which such a deal for aviation could be structured.
I can announce my intention to promote an international agreement to secure the same kind of progressively stricter limits on carbon dioxide emissions from aircraft as are already in place for cars within the European Union. My honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State has been in Tokyo this week setting out to a meeting of G7 Transport Ministers how this can be achieved.
But I want to go further. Work published by the aviation industry already illustrates how it could reduce UK emissions below 2005 levels by 2050. This could include the use of new technologies such as blended wings and through the sustainable introduction of renewable fuels. I can announce that we will establish a new target to get aviation emissions in 2050 below 2005 levels, and I have asked the Committee on Climate Change to advise on the best basis for its development. The Government will monitor carefully the emissions from aviation, with the help of the Committee on Climate Change.
Any future capacity increases at Heathrow, beyond the decision I have announced today, will be approved by the Government only after a review by the Committee on Climate Change in 2020 of whether we are on track to achieve the 2050 target that I have announced.
So we are effectively taking three steps to limit any increase in carbon dioxide emissions: first, we are limiting the initial extra capacity to around half of the original proposal; secondly, we intend that new slots at Heathrow will have to be green slots—only the cleanest planes would be allowed to use the new slots that will be made available—and, thirdly, we will establish a new target to limit aviation emissions in the UK to below 2005 levels by 2050. Taken together, this gives us the toughest climate change regime for aviation of any country in the world, which gives Ministers the confidence that we will achieve our 80 per cent emissions reduction target. In addition, we will make it one of our highest priorities to secure international agreement on measures to reduce aviation emissions.
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The airport clearly needs new capacity as soon as possible so as to reduce delays and improve resilience. Since I am not willing to allow the two existing runways to operate on mixed mode, I anticipate that the airport operator will bring forward a planning application for a new runway to be operational early in the period between 2015 and 2020, envisaged in the White Paper.
The parallel review of the economic regulation of airports is focusing on how best to improve the passenger experience and encourage investment. In the regulatory framework which results from this work, I expect the first call on new capacity to ensure that journeys are more reliable for existing passengers. We will therefore have a better airport.
These announcements on transport infrastructure, on motorways, on railways, on Heathrow, and on carbon reductions from domestic transport show the Government taking the right decisions for the long term, delivering real help with job creation today, and creating real hope for Britain’s long-term growth prospects: real help in securing carbon reductions; real help for rail passengers; and real help in increasing the long-term competitiveness of the UK economy by creating excellent transport links to the global economy, ensuring this remains an attractive country in which to do business. I commend this Statement to the House”.
My Lords, that concludes the Statement.
2.48 pm
Lord Hanningfield: My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the Statement made in the other House. I often agree with much of what he says, but I do not find much to agree with in this Statement. It seems that much of it is meant to cover the announcement of another runway at Heathrow. In view of everything he said, this is a very bleak day for the Government’s environmental credentials. It is a bleak day for the millions who opposed the Government’s plan to expand Heathrow, and a terrible day for the millions who live under the current flight path, and for those who will suffer from the new flight path and plans.
We have consistently been opposed to the third runway at Heathrow and feel that it will be an environmental disaster. We have consistently opposed the Government’s White Paper on aviation policy, which highlighted and promoted growth only in the south-east, and feel that it would have been better for regeneration and other things to have a more national aviation policy. As discussions in this House have shown, Heathrow needs reorganising, not another runway. We feel that the Government are—as will emerge over the next few weeks and months—on the wrong side of the argument over Heathrow, and increasingly on the wrong side of the environmental argument.
As for the Government’s assurances on the environment, there have been quite a few announcements recently. The House will need to analyse those issues and I hope we can debate them further. But the assurances lack credibility. I am interested in the idea of green planes and green slots but we have not seen them yet; perhaps the Minister can tell us more. The 2050 target is interesting but is rather a long way away.
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The Minister also made an economic argument but that case also has not been properly put. There is very little evidence supporting the claim that people will not use Heathrow unless it expands. It is not logical. Perhaps the Government will explain it. What evidence is there to support increasing the number of runways or the argument on economic prosperity? Frankfurt has a bigger airport than London but London is a far bigger financial centre. The Statement says a lot about increasing the number of jobs. We all want that to happen immediately but, with the planning process, those jobs are many years away. It will not provide jobs now. Perhaps we can analyse that a bit more.
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