Local Transport Bill [HL] Bill

moved Amendment No. 7A: 7A: Clause 8, page 10, line 24, at end insert— ““(c) to have regard to relevant plans and strategies published by any relevant rail infrastructure manager.”” The noble Lord said: I shall speak also to the other amendments in this group. Amendment No. 7A is about integrating road and rail policies—or, as the former Deputy Prime Minister, my right honourable friend John Prescott, used to say, ““integrated transport””, which I always thought was rather a good idea. The Bill requires each local transport authority to produce local transport policies, "““for the promotion and encouragement of safe, integrated, efficient and economic transport to, from and within their area””;" but it also puts a duty on local transport authorities to take into account any policies announced by government which relate to these things. In the integration of road and rail transport, there is already good contact between Network Rail, which tends to lead these things, and many local authorities, but I am not sure that that is quite enough. The new integrated transport authorities have a duty to consult, and Network Rail’s new route utilisation strategies which already cover much of the country have been taken into account. It is, however, interesting to reflect on what the House of Commons Select Committee on Transport said about the Bill. It said that Clause 57, the relevant clause in the draft Bill, "““should be revised to place a duty on authorities to take account of the full range of national transport policies. Reducing the effects of climate change is only one of a number of vital policy objectives that should be observed in PTA decision-making, and one such objective should not be singled out on the face of the Bill””." Local authorities are already consulted on these route utilisation strategies, but it would be good if the Bill provided for a formal requirement for consultation between road and rail operations; otherwise some local authorities will undoubtedly decide not to do it. It is quite easy to change bus routes, bus stops and all the other things we will talk about when we reach the relevant part of the Bill, but it is sometimes difficult to change the rail side even with the route utilisation strategies—which are very good and have had lots of consultation. If local transport bodies are to develop safe, integrated, efficient and economic transport locally as the Bill requires, they must take into account the area’s current and future rail capacity as well as all the other things. I beg to move.