Road Safety Bill [HL]

moved Amendment No. 134:"After Clause 38, insert the following new clause—"    ““APPLICATION OF SURPLUS INCOME FROM SAFETY CAMERA ENFORCEMENT    In section 38 of the Vehicle (Crimes) Act 2001 (c. 3) (unified power for Secretary of State to fund speed cameras etc.), after subsection (5) insert— ““(6)   The relevant national authority may make regulations to permit in specified circumstances income from the enforcement of offences under subsection (2), over and above such income as is required to cover expenditure on the operation of a safety camera scheme, to be used in connection with the provision by the relevant local transport authority of local transport facilities or related environmental improvements, including road safety measures.”””” The noble Baroness said: We are all agreed that road safety is a national issue. Certainly our discussions today have been all national in focus. It also has tangible implications for local authorities. Those local authorities have individual responsibilities, but they are also providing the funding and implementation of necessary road safety measures. Across the country there is a vast wealth of expertise and knowledge in local authorities pertaining to the geography and character of local road safety and the measures required to address them, so they are in a good position to be able to understand the specific road safety problems. The Minister mentioned that there is a discretionary power for motorcycles, which I recognise. Unfortunately the money currently being invested in local road safety is not adequate and could be significantly enhanced if local authorities were allowed to keep the money from road safety cameras. At the moment, fines collected by safety camera partnerships can be used only for the installation, operation and maintenance of approved safety cameras in accordance with the year’s operational case. The Minister almost admitted that there are fine feelings among people who are fined after being detected by speed cameras that they are contributing in spades to the Exchequer and are not seeing any return for the fact that they have committed an offence. The surplus achieved—I have not bothered to find out how much it is, but I suspect that it is very substantial—goes to the Treasury. It cannot be used to pay for additional police or any other local authority activity that could bring in road safety measures. This clause remedies the situation by allowing any surplus income from safety cameras to be used by the relevant local transport authority for the provision of transport facilities or environmental improvements, including road safety measures. It provides a source of funding that would enable local expertise to be translated into local road safety initiatives. Most people would accept that. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s reply. I beg to move.