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Concessionary Bus Travel Bill [HL]

As I was completing a 12,000-mile air trip yesterday, I had a nightmare that there might be at least one amendment that I would not understand at all. The noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, has kindly provided that amendment. As he said, this is an extremely difficult issue, but he will rest assured that the all-seeing, all-knowing Government have talents at their disposal besides my own humble ones. Therefore, people have been working on this issue and can do rather better than he foresaw; namely, that we can give him some kind of answer, although not one that he will wholly approve of because we do not agree that his amendments, which seek to remove bus travel from the reserve free travel scheme that guarantees concessionary travel in London, are in the interests of either Londoners or the rest of the country. The Committee will be well aware, because the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, has already informed us, that the purpose of the reserve scheme is to ensure that, should there be no agreement between the London boroughs or between the boroughs and TfL on arrangements for concessionary travel in the capital, a fallback scheme guaranteeing certain minimum concessions applies. This arrangement has been in place since the Greater London Authority Act 1999. What the noble Lord suggests will not help. The amendments do not serve the interests of Londoners or, indeed, the interests of others from outside London who want to enjoy concessionary travel in the capital when the Bill becomes law. The amendments would be to remove the fallback arrangements that guarantee the delivery of the national concession in the capital. I understand the argument the noble Lord puts on behalf of the local authorities. He said that it weakens the bargaining position of the local authorities vis-à-vis TfL because of the fallback position, but the proposed replacement for this guarantee would be the rolling-over of existing arrangements for another year. If there are no arrangements offering the free concession on buses in London under Section 240(1) at the end of a year, then rolling the same arrangement on for a further year will make no difference: there will still be no arrangements for free bus travel. Amendments Nos. 24, 52 and 62 remove the obligation for free bus travel for eligible people at off-peak times on local bus services. Therefore, arrangements might offer a half discount with no consequences. Under the legislation, there is no obligation to make arrangements under Section 240(1). They are voluntary. While at the moment the reserve travel scheme guarantees the national concession, if it were disapplied as envisaged, there would be no such guarantee. If no arrangements existed at the end of a year, perhaps because a party had terminated the agreement for whatever reason, there may be no arrangements to roll over and the result would be no concession at all in London. Even if there were existing arrangements to roll over, this will still not guarantee free travel. The agreement specifying these arrangements is voluntary. There is nothing in the legislation which would prevent a party to the arrangements from terminating its agreement if it wanted to for whatever reason. It is also possible that the parties can vary the terms of the arrangements by agreement. They could, for example, agree only to offer half-price travel rather than free travel. In summary, complex though the issue is, it comes down to a straightforward question of whether the amendments proposed by the noble Lord would be workable and in the interests of Londoners. I do not think that it would be right for us to rely on a voluntary agreement that could disappear at any time, and which includes terms that were not consistent with the national concession, which is the underlying principle of the Bill. I recognise where the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, is coming from. I see the force of his representation, but I fear that his amendments might have the most deleterious consequences for free travel in London just when we are seeking, under the Bill, to guarantee free travel across the nation. Therefore, I think that the Committee will recognise that I must oppose his amendments.