My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendment 58 in this group.
The first amendment is to make clear that the ORR, or whatever we end up calling it, will be a regulator as well as simply a monitor. I said earlier that we needed something equivalent to the ORR, which monitors the rail network, to be applied to the road system. There are areas of a strategic road system that need to be regulated. They include safety records—I declare my interest as chair of the Road Safety Foundation. They also include environmental performance in relation to all sorts of things such as carbon emissions, air pollution, water runoff and so on. Someone needs to be regulating specifically the strategic network, which is seen increasingly as a system. It has hitherto been subject to either general regulation or specific regulation by the Department for Transport.
It is important that the new body, as it extends its role into roads, is seen to have as powerful a leverage in that area as the ORR does in rail, to achieve the excellent levels of safety that we have achieved in the railway system in recent years and to ensure that
the strategic network continues to make substantial improvements in the safety record on the highways network. If the Government maintain their line that the monitor is not a regulator, then it is not just a question of symmetry between the different modes but a question of the effectiveness of the Government’s role in relation to the strategic transportation system within England. The ORR-plus needs to be given that clear role.
As to my second amendment, I suspect that I shall get from the Minister the same answer that I received in relation to the Passengers’ Council’s funding. It is important, though, to recognise that this situation is unusual. In energy, water and telecoms the money comes from the regulated industry. In her response on the issue of funding for the Passengers’ Council-plus, the Minister said that it would come from the Government. I assume that I am going to get the same answer in relation to the regulator/monitor.
It is important for the Government to recognise that this is unusual, and someone sitting in the Treasury probably realises that. On reflection, I still think that this should probably be a matter for the user organisation, the watchdog, if such a provision were to be written into the legislation. Some future Chancellor, of whatever party, may ask: “Why are we, the taxpayer, paying for this in relation to transport, when in all the other regulated sectors it is the industry that pays for it?”. In the great scheme of things, the Treasury, wearing another hat, regards all this as taxation because it is a mandated levy on the industry, but in terms of the impact on the general expenditure of the Government it is in a different category. It would therefore be useful not only to have on the record the Minister saying that that is how this body will be funded but, for added certainty, to put something like that in the Bill. I beg to move.