My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 91 to which I have added my name, and to Amendment 469 in the names of my noble friend Lady Pinnock and myself. I also want to express general support for the amendments in this very disparate group.
On Amendment 91, some noble Lords will be aware that I am also at the moment participating in debates on the Strikes (Minimum Service Levels) Bill and the retained EU law Bill. There are some overlapping issues, and one is the role of trade unions and the interaction between the powers of the UK Government and the powers of employers, including, of course, local government as employers.
Last week on the strikes Bill, I raised the issue of the powers of devolved Administrations. The Minister was unable to give assurances that the UK Government—who, by the way, on issues that are devolved are just the English Government—will not simply override the devolved Administrations. Applying that logic to this Bill, which purports to increase devolution within English local government, it is reasonable for us to ask what the status of trade unions within local government will be and whether the UK Government will seek to override English local authorities in the same way as they intend to override devolved Administrations. The lessons are similar in both Bills.
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Amendment 469 relates to the right of local authorities to run their own bus services. My very first job when I was elected as a councillor in 1983 was as a member of the transport committee of Cardiff City Council. I was a member during the infamous period of bus deregulation in 1986. London was of course the exception to bus deregulation. At that time, deregulation was lauded by the Conservative Government as the way to create a modern, efficient bus industry. The divergent history of bus services in London, where they have thrived, and the rest of the UK, where they have struggled for decades, has proved how wrong the Government at that time were.
We last had the opportunity in this House to save our bus services outside London in the Bus Services Act 2017. At that time, I put down an amendment similar to this one, which was not accepted. Although, in our discussions on that Bill, there was some late acceptance of the need for a stronger role for local authorities in planning bus services through franchising, there was explicit rejection of powers for local authorities to set up and control local bus companies. Since that Bill was passed, our already sparse and declining bus services have hit crisis point because of the pandemic.
I remind noble Lords that this Bill is a levelling-up Bill. Our bus services are used by a far larger percentage of the population than the train services. They are by far the most popular form of public transport. The
sectors of the population who use bus services are the poorer, the older and the younger, and they are women rather than men. Those services are key to accessing training, further education, jobs for young people and jobs for people who have been unemployed. They provide access to a social life for many who would otherwise be isolated. They allow grandparents to visit and help care for grandchildren. Without them, many rural communities would be isolated.
In advocating that local authorities should have the power to set up bus services, I imagine, in truth, that only the largest would probably want to do so on a comprehensive basis. I think, however, that many would wish to be able to set up a small bus company, for example, to run buses that are timetabled to give access to local FE colleges and to go into town at the start and end of the working day and shopping day, taking the place of commercial buses that have withdrawn and are failing to provide a good service. I expect that many local authorities will not want to intervene, but many will want to fill a gap if it occurs.
Without good local transport services, there can be no levelling up for the poorest, the oldest and the youngest. I remind noble Lords that we need to be looking at the future, and we need to be providing these services for young people to get to jobs, to training and to education, if we are to level up for the future. Buses are a key part of that.