Local Transport Bill [Lords]

My hon. Friend makes an acute observation about how the Conservatives behave. What happened when those counties were abolished? The links between local democracy, local choice, local taxation and control of local bus services were broken. They were broken on the basis that although the people involved—Nicholas Ridley, who was Secretary of State, and some officials and outside advisers—did not know what would happen when deregulation of bus services was introduced, they believed that private, commercially operated bus companies would respond to the requirements of the travelling public by providing a better service. Indeed, in a small number of cases services did improve, but in the vast majority of cases they declined. We have already heard of the statistics, such as doubled bus fares, half the passenger numbers and reduced mileage, and they are well known in respect of areas outside London. What is less often expressed about the experience is that the bus companies did not respond as flexible, competing businesses serving the travelling public, but instead they became subsidy junkies. They responded to the amount of subsidy that was available, and they catered their services not for the travelling public, but for how much grant they could get. The Brian Souters of this world—he is from Stagecoach—go around saying how good they are at providing a service, but in fact they are always asking for huge subsidies. Unless hon. Members know of the parliamentary question I asked last week, I would be surprised if they are aware that the Government believe that the subsidy outside the London area in the deregulated system is £3,500 per year per bus. The PTE group believes that for tendered services the subsidy per bus per year is £53,500—£1,000 per week per bus travelling in the system outside London. That is incredible. When there was local democracy, local taxation and control of services, for that amount of money we would have expected to be able to say what would be the frequency of service and where the buses went. Of course, that sum does not include investment in bus lanes and bus shelters and other parts of the transport infrastructure, which the Brian Souters of this world are always asking for while forgetting that they are being hugely subsidised. As a percentage of their overall businesses, they make more money and get a better return on their investment—although their buses are older—in the deregulated area than in other parts of the system. Overall, the bus industry is left with fewer passengers and we have twice the average bus fare of France, Germany and elsewhere in the EU before its recent enlargement. Therefore it is unsurprising if there has been a decline in bus fares. Let me swiftly address the proposals, and some of the problems that I envisage and that I hope can be dealt with in Committee. I welcome the fact that the Government will leave the creation of integrated transport authorities up to local initiative; it will be for a local passenger transport authority to come forward and say, ““We have a better scheme.”” What lies behind that is the belief, for which there is supporting evidence, that if we transfer highways powers to a transport authority, and the transport authority can put in bus lanes and change traffic management orders for the whole of an urban conurbation, there is likely to be increased usage of buses and more bus priority measures. It is understood that that is what is behind this proposal, but I have concerns about the process by which we get there, and at what levels Members and the electorate will be involved. On the process, in terms of addressing a medium-sized local government reorganisation—in the case of Greater Manchester it would involve 11 authorities and a number of functions—how adequate would the affirmative procedure and a one-and-a-half hour debate on the Floor of the House be? That does not seem adequate; we do not normally deal with local government reorganisation in that way. I would not go the whole hog by saying that we should have primary legislation to make such changes, but I ask my Front-Bench colleagues seriously to consider making them by a regulatory reform order. Such an order would, as part of its nature, give people directly affected by the scheme the right to make direct representations to the appropriate Committee of this House. If that Committee thought the matter controversial or worthy of a debate, it could ensure that a three-hour debate took place on the Floor of the House. Anybody who witnessed what happened recently in Cheshire over the creation of two authorities will know that the reorganisation of functions and powers of local authorities is controversial, and that hon. Members and the public have views on such things. That is the position as far as the House changing the law and the powers of local authorities is concerned, but what about the people? Although the concern of transport Bills and the Transport Committee is to improve transport, there are competing issues as to whether an area has bus lanes or not. The right hon. Member for East Yorkshire mentioned the appropriate example of the debate in Birmingham about bus lanes. We would be saying to the local electorate that they can no longer vote directly for the person who will makes choices on those functions. One obvious solution is to have a directly elected transport body, some other form of election or a serious form of consultation before those decisions are made. In terms of filling the gap left following the abolition of the Greater Manchester authority and the other metropolitan authorities, the Bill is democratically inadequate; there is a democratic deficit in dealing with those matters. I come to local authorities, because if those powers are transferred, this will not be just about the electorate. Bury metropolitan borough council or Trafford council, which oppose a congestion charge in Greater Manchester, can say individually, ““We are a unitary local authority. We do not have to agree with what everybody else says. These are our highways. We are not going ahead with it.”” If the powers are transferred by a simple process in the Bill, both Bury metropolitan borough council and the Bury electorate would have no direct say in what is happening. The case needs to be thought through a great deal more than it has been.