Clause 6
Local Transport Bill [Lords]
4:45 pm
Rosie Winterton (Minister of State, Department for Transport; Doncaster Central, Labour)
Clause 6 empowers the Secretary of State to make any necessary consequential changes to other legislation through secondary legislation, to give full effect to the provisions in clauses 2 to 5 of the Bill. We have done that because there are a number of references in other legislation. To choose the Transport Act 2000, for example, there may be references to work that a traffic commissioner can do. The legislation might, for example, say that in order to get a particular licence or to operate in a certain way individuals should apply to the traffic commissioner in their area. What we are trying to do in the clause is to fit in with the idea that there might be functions that could be done more effectively at national level, say in an office of the traffic commissioner. If there were applications that could be made to such an office, it would be necessary to remove the function from the traffic commissioner in each region. For us to try to go through every piece of existing legislation and make the changes in the Bill would be time-consuming, and we might miss something out. Through secondary legislation, we have the ability to make any changes that would allow such activities to happen.
We think that there are more than 80 references to traffic areas in primary and secondary legislation, and more than 600 references to traffic commissioners. In order properly to implement the provisions in clauses 2 to 5, in some cases it will be necessary to make consequential amendments to many of those references.
The amendment proposed by the hon. Member for Wimbledon, which I take to be a probing amendment, would prevent those consequential amendments from making such changes. The problem is that it would reduce flexibility when implementing the proposals contained in the Bill.
It may help the Committee if I make it clear that all orders under that power would be subject to the affirmative resolution procedure, and that any order under clause 6 will apply in Scotland only in relation to reserved, not devolved, matters. I hope that is helpful in explaining why clause 6 is in the Bill and why we are asking the Committee not to accept the amendment, as it would reverse what we are trying to do.