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Local Transport

I commend that general approach. The Department for Communities and Local Government is a relatively young Department, but there is greater scope for some joined-up thinking and joint working between it and the Department for Transport. The social consequences, never mind the economic, congestion and environmental consequences, of not putting in the transport first and letting the other developments follow are obvious for all to see. If we have learned nothing else since the 1960s, when that approach was specifically disavowed, we should at least have learned that much. As the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich said, this should really be a Back Benchers’ debate, but I want briefly to touch on the following areas: first, the departmental guidance on the preparation of local transport plans; secondly, the operation of the transport innovation fund; and thirdly, the strengthening of passenger transport authorities and passenger transport executives. There could not be a more unambiguous statement of the situation that local authorities face than paragraph 31 of the report:"““If Local Transport Plans are to adequately reflect local objectives, the guidance and the scoring methodology must be rewritten to support it, and the way local and national priorities are weighted should be available to councils. It is unacceptable that local authorities are effectively penalised for pursuing regeneration and job creation schemes. The Department’s Local Transport Plan assessment should make it clear that local authorities can prioritise specific local transport needs, such as economic regeneration, and that those priorities will be given proper weight. That said, it is incumbent on local authorities that wish to emphasise local transport priorities to be bolder in pursuing their objectives.””" I have always been of the view that transport exists as a service to underpin and reinforce Government policy in other areas. Social inclusion is one of the greatest opportunities, particularly when it involves a bus service, and economic regeneration and economic development is another. That relates to the point made by the hon. Member for Castle Point (Bob Spink) a few minutes ago. The inability to integrate transport planning into other policy areas is one of the biggest failings, and it is one of the biggest frustrations for many people in local government today. The final point in paragraph 31—"““it is incumbent on local authorities that wish to emphasise local transport priorities to be bolder in pursuing their objectives””—" is absolutely true, but we must recognise that such failures often stem from the almost siege mentality that now exists in many local authorities as a result of the constant battering at the hands of central Government. Turning to the measurement of local transport plans, the Committee should be commended for its work in that area. Paragraph 36 states:"““It is wrong that local authorities are measured against targets over which they have no direct control, such as bus satisfaction or passenger numbers. Either local authorities need direct control over these services; or they should not be held responsible for them.””" That is an irrefutable conclusion. I am delighted that this something of a work in progress, now that we have the Government’s White Paper on reforming bus regulation. If what is produced at the end of the process strengthens local provision, and in particular local accountability, I would certainly be prepared to support it. On bus regulation, the Committee’s comments at paragraph 177 on the strengthening of the powers of passenger transport authorities are particularly pertinent in relation to the metropolitan areas, because those are the areas where there has been the greatest failure in the deregulated bus market, and it has ceased to operate effectively. Allowing for more powers and meaningful resourcing of passenger transport executives and passenger transport authorities must lie at the heart of developing the Government’s bus policy. The deregulated system has worked well in some places—I think of Brighton, Harrogate, York and Cambridge—but that is because they are towns and cities of a certain size that have the critical mass of population to be able to make the integration of partnership working effective. In areas such as Greater Manchester, for example, it is pretty clear that that has not been the case. I should place on record my appreciation of the work of the Greater Manchester PTA, which is among the most effective of the authorities with which I have come into contact since I took on this brief. Particular credit goes to the Labour chairman, who has been assiduous in bringing the concerns of his organisation to Government. On the transport innovation fund, I agree with the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich that we can all welcome the significant injection of funds that it represents. However, in paragraph 116 the Committee makes pertinent comments about the way in which the transport innovation fund threatens the very concept of local transport planning:"““The Transport Innovation Fund is not in any way about local choice or local schemes but about central government transferring its risk to local councils for what are schemes of national importance. It is not about innovation; it is about central control.””" I fear that the transport innovation fund might eventually defeat the Government’s own policy, particularly on congestion. A patchwork of pilot schemes designed to tackle congestion might be difficult to bring together thereafter and to marry into one national scheme. I think that pilot schemes are emerging because that is the only show in town as regards local authorities getting money for transport innovation. We might be left with a series of areas where action to tackle congestion proves to be unpopular because it is seen as being an extra charge. That could put at risk instead of encourage the creation of a national scheme, which everybody who is serious about tackling congestion should accept. The House will soon consider the national concessionary bus travel scheme, which has already been dealt with in the other place. I am keen that we should all be able to unite around that scheme, which my party, in co-operation with the Labour party in Scotland, has been able to implement and to promote. My concern about the way in which it has been handled in the other place so far is that we risk taking an idea that everyone supports and implementing it in such a way that it will end up offending most people. Trying to fund a scheme as a bolt-on to the local government settlement is setting it up to fail. Hon. Members will be aware that the basis on which local authorities are given their financial settlement every year is byzantine to the point of being opaque, and has little to do with bus ridership in their areas. Significant numbers of local authority areas will struggle to finance the scheme because the funding has been given in such a way. I hope that when the Bill comes before the House the Government will look again at how the scheme will be funded and that they will take seriously the opportunities presented by a nationwide smartcard scheme, for example. That would be the best way of relating the money that goes to councils for the provision of services to their actual use. Failure to do that will mean that a significant number of areas, particularly in coastal and resort towns, will suffer, which surely cannot be an outcome that the Government intend.