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Local Transport Bill [HL]

My Lords, I would rather not paint precise scenarios. It is hard to predict the circumstances in which services might come to a halt. However, if there were to be a scenario of the kind painted by my noble friend of a service coming to an end in circumstances where legal proceedings followed, even by the rather lengthy proceeding standards of our learned friends, one would realistically expect them to have been concluded well within a 12-month period. Therefore, we would not expect such a scenario to justify an extension of the 12-month period. However, I come back to the central point that this is intended to give local authorities the power to act as operator of last resort, not to put in place their own bus services on an ongoing basis. Recognising that we have to make a judgment about a cut-off point at some defined period, our view is that 12 months is the longest period in which one could justify a local authority acting as operator of last resort, and that any local authority which is fulfilling its duties responsibly would be able to put in place a replacement service over that period. If a local authority was incapable of putting in place a replacement service in 12 months, it is very difficult to see what circumstance will change in the thirteenth month that is suddenly going to make it possible to act in a way it was incapable of acting in the previous 12 months. Therefore, even in the scenario that my noble friend paints of there being complicating factors surrounding the ending of a bus operation, we believe that the 12-month period is sufficient to put in place successor arrangements, and that we should not need to extend the 12-month period further. On that basis, I beg to move. On Question, Motion agreed to.