Local Transport Bill [Lords]

My hon. Friend the Minister found himself in difficulties on this issue. I sympathise, because he walked into the job only very recently. I genuinely hope to be helpful by going through the issues as I see them. I hope that we can come to a resolution, if not now, then possibly in the other place. When the metropolitan county councils were abolished, it became the constituent authorities' responsibility to send members to the passenger transport authorities and other joint boards. After a lot of argument, it became clear that rules had to be applied to retain the correct political balance. At best, my hon. Friend was not clear about the fact that that political balance relates to the number of members sent to the PTA by the constituent districts. If, for example, there was a Labour majority of one in Wolverhampton, the district could not send three or four Labour delegates to the PTA; it had to be proportionate. That requires a little thought. Although the constituent authorities will do their best to send a proportionate balance of members to the PTA—or, in future, the integrated transport authority—it is likely that the final balance will not reflect the balance across the county. If, as seems intended in new clauses 10 and 11, we reduce the number of council representatives on the integrated transport authorities to one per authority—that is the minimum—it becomes impossible to reflect the political balance in the county, unless the county is a statistical freak. There are difficulties to do with where we start. In Committee, we discussed holding direct elections or referendums to set up the bodies, but that is not what the amendments that we are discussing are about. In new clause 10(5) and (6), there is both a prohibition on having non-elected members on an ITA, and a power giving ITAs the ability to waive that prohibition. It is not clear what the purpose is of providing for such members. I do not mind the 47 professors of transport that universities feel they need being on integrated transport authorities. I do not mind bus operators or passengers being on them, either. Discussion with those people would add to elected members' knowledge. However, what is the purpose of allowing non-elected members to vote? I have not heard the Minister give any good reason for that. I should like to query one statement of fact that the Minister made. He said that voting arrangements were determined locally. That is simply at odds with the facts. Local authorities cannot co-opt people with voting rights on to them. In fact, the right is jealously guarded. The Local Government Act 1972 got rid of aldermen, who had been there for ever—I mean, some of them, personally, had been there for ever. From that point on, all directly elected local authorities have been just that—they have had only elected members. That was the political balance. Where there are joint boards, an attempt is made to recreate that political balance on them. The one exception is police authorities. Historically, magistrates have long been seen as almost equal, if not equal, to elected members of such authorities, but all the other authorities have jealously guarded the situation. I would therefore be fascinated to hear the objective, beyond that of providing expertise, behind allowing non-elected members. The Minister said repeatedly that elected members will be in a majority, but that is not really the point. Those of us who stand for election do so because we believe certain things. Often, parties believe different things; that is why their representatives stand for election. What matters is the political balance. If the Labour party or Conservative party has one representative on a body, that is the balance that matters, and not whether there are more elected than non-elected members. I ask my hon. Friend to think about that, because as things stand—given the fact that the relationship between subsections (5) and (6) is ill-defined, and given that there is no clear stated objective—the process can change the political balance of the authority, and we do not know how long for; it may be for four years, or for one year. That can be done while elected members remain in a majority. As the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Stephen Hammond) said, I attempted to define and address some of those issues in amendment No. 101. Having listened to the debate, however, I think that it does not go far enough. I certainly will not press it to a Division, but I look to the Minister at least to make a statement in the House saying that he will look into the issues with a view to ensuring that the political balance is maintained within authorities. What is proposed in the Bill is at best ill-defined. The provisions were introduced in response to comments made in Committee, and I accept the Government's good will, but they could work to undermine essentially good proposals. I cast the problem as being to do not just with members, but with the purpose of setting up integrated transport authorities; the Minister referred to that. In one sense, the purpose is to say, ““Transport has probably not been considered as important as it should have been in the local democratic context, and we will give it a shove. We will have integrated transport authorities, and after consultation and once statutory instruments have been agreed to in this place and the other place, we will give them the ability to take highways powers away from local authorities.”” If that is the purpose—to give a push to transport—one has to keep the scheme in the most powerfully democratic context that one can. I have been on passenger transport authorities, and I have been on the Transport Committee, although I was not on it when I was a member of the Government. I believe in giving transport as much help as it can get, but there are competing interests that must also be part of the democratic process. If one is setting up a bus priority measure, shopkeepers, local residents and pedestrians will often have very different views about it. If the proposals in the Bill were agreed to, and those with special interests from the transport world altered the political balance, there would be less and less possibility of people who disagree with transport proposals gaining their point through the democratic process.