Local Transport Bill [HL]

My Lords, this group of amendments obviously concerns membership of ITAs. The noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, has the right understanding here. We have made clear that we believe existing legislation covering PTAs is too restrictive. Setting out in primary legislation the majority of the detail of how such authorities are established and how they work does not provide sufficient flexibility for different arrangements to be set up in different areas, or for these to develop as circumstances change. It is vital to incorporate the flexibility for the membership arrangements for an ITA to be determined in secondary legislation. Such legislation would, of course, be subject to the affirmative resolution procedure in your Lordships’ House and in another place. The arrangements for membership of an individual ITA—which will be set out in an order—would emanate from the governance scheme put forward by that area’s local authorities under Clause 71 or Clause 72. That would be subject to widespread consultation. In essence, what can be achieved here is local determination, with a governance structure that comes up from the locality. Of course it is important for an ITA to be democratically accountable to the people in the area it represents. To ensure this, Clause 73(3) requires that a majority of an ITA’s members would need to be elected councillors of those local authorities which fall within the ITA’s area. What is more, if they considered that this was more appropriate, the authorities carrying out a review could choose to propose that the ITA’s membership should remain comprised of local councillors only. There is that extra element built into it. It would be open to them to propose that representatives from other sectors should be members of the ITA. For instance, this could include representatives of business or the Highways Agency—we have learnt today from the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, of the important value of relations between the Highways Agency and local authorities. We have heard from others today of the value of having Network Rail consulted, and it would be open to the ITA to have that sort of membership. Importantly, transport users, too, could be included. Each of those consultees could bring relevant, wider experience and expertise. The capacity for that exists. It is important to ensure that appointments follow proper procedures—I do not think that anybody would demur from that. Therefore, where the secondary legislation relating to a particular ITA area provided that the ITA’s membership should include one or more non-elected persons, it would also need to include provisions establishing how those representatives would be appointed. In the light of that, I hope that noble Lords will not press the amendment. We in good faith want to see the governance schemes directed from within the locality and responsive to local needs for the valuable interaction with a range of other bodies that can take place at that level, if that is what is required locally. The amendment would bring a measure of inflexibility to arrangements that perhaps need to be flexible to ensure wider representation, respecting, as we all do, the value of the majority democratic element.