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Road Pricing

: Galileo will certainly be a great help, not only for road pricing but for many companies that will be able to build technologies on the back of Galileo signals. I have no doubt that it will be a major boost to high-tech industry across Europe generally. There is a debate to be had on whether we could build a road pricing system based on available satellite signals or whether we would need Galileo. There is no question but that if Galileo is available, it will be easier. However, some suppliers have said that they could build detector systems to go in a car that would be accurate enough to work with the existing satellite deployment available from the United States. There is not a clear answer to the hon. Gentleman's question, which is a good one. Galileo is not essential for road pricing, and there other types of technology that we can consider deploying. However, Galileo would make things much easier. I hope that we are now making progress towards sorting out the issues in that regard, and that we shall have good news about it in the not-too-distant future. The right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire asked whether the technology is available. Certain types of technology that have been identified immediately as potential elements of the marketplace may be available, but issues arise to be considered. We know of some technologies that are immediately available. Tag and beacon, for example, is relatively easy to deploy, and we know that it will work, but it means that every car must have a tag and we must deploy beacons along every road where we want road pricing, or around the zone of any congestion charge. The technology works well. It works on the Dartford crossing and is available on many toll roads. Some of the pilot systems that we will consider might use tag and beacon technology. My hon. Friend the Member for Crewe and Nantwich asked how the technologies deployed in the pilots would be built into the final scheme of things. I do not have a complete answer. It would be wonderful if we could identify now the technology to deploy on pilot schemes, which would be the technology in use in 10 years' time. Realistically, that may not be possible. We may have to start with schemes that use technologies that will help us to answer questions, but that we intend to abandon in the long term because we do not see them as the ultimate answer. One question to which an answer is vital is whether road pricing will change people's behaviour. If the answer is no we may as well stop now, because road pricing will not be the answer to congestion. Unless it makes people travel at a different time of day or on a different modality or on a different route, what is the point? It will not help us with congestion. There may be trials that we need to conduct to test that. Will road pricing affect the behaviour of the motoring public? The technology with which we ask that question might not, in the circumstances, be so significant. We may be able to plot a technological road map to where we want to be. We may be able to identify now where the technology that we want to deploy will be in 10 years, and set milestones using different types of technology, as we move towards the final system.