Clause 44
Local Transport Bill [Lords]
4:15 pm
Rosie Winterton (Minister of State, Department for Transport; Doncaster Central, Labour)
As the hon. Gentleman said, the amendments would place decisions as to whether additional services could be operated in an area covered by a quality contracts scheme with the traffic commissioner, rather than the local authority that made the scheme. Perhaps I could briefly explain the purpose behind the clause. It provides an exception to the general rule that in an area where a quality contracts scheme is in place, all services must be provided under quality contracts. That means that no other services can be registered with the traffic commissioner to operate in the area. There is already a power for the authority to exclude certain services or types of service from the scheme, and they may be registered with the traffic commissioner in the usual way. For example, long-distance services with only one or two stops in the scheme area might be excluded, or services for a niche market such as tour buses or works buses.
A need or demand may arise, however, during the lifetime of a scheme for services that were not anticipated when the scheme was developed, and which might be advantageous, or further niche services might be identified that would not particularly affect the viability of the scheme one way or another. It would be very unsatisfactory if there were no way of allowing those services to be provided other than by formally amending the scheme. The clause would give the local transport authority the discretion to allow operators to run additional services that were not detrimental to the scheme, and those services would be registered with the traffic commissioner in the normal way.
In normal circumstances, traffic commissioners do not have the power to reject applications to register, provided the operator is licensed. It is right that the local transport authority that made the scheme in the first place should decide whether a proposed new service is compatible with the quality contracts scheme. The amendments would take that function away from the local authority and give it to the traffic commissioner. He would apparently have total discretion as to what to allow and what to reject. Although the local transport authority would be consulted, the decision would be entirely out of its hands. That would make it possible, for example, for an operator to register a service that would compete with one provided under a quality contract, possibly undermining the financial basis of the contract.
The aim of providing flexibility is to allow the local authority to say that it accepts that a particular service will not undermine the quality contracts scheme, and that it is happy for it to go ahead and for it to be registered with the traffic commissioner. We believe that the local authority that made the scheme should have the discretion to do so, and we do not believe that the decision should be handed over to the traffic commissioner. I hope that that explanation is useful and that the hon. Member for Wimbledon will withdraw his amendment.