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Civil Aviation Bill

Before I start, may I say in passing how much I admire the rulings of the Chairman of Ways and Means? He is a great gentleman and I apologise for having been told off by him earlier. The Minister will know that I raised in Committee one point about regulation. As she will recall, I raised the concerns of a very big business and a large industry in my constituency—DHL and the industry trade body, the Association of International Courier & Express Services—about the information provisions. I thanked the Minister then and I thank her now for the positive comments she made about the express services sector. As she acknowledged, DHL is a very significant employer in my constituency, and obviously a key player in the wider UK exports market. As the Minister knows, the express sector as a whole is broadly supportive of the Bill and wants to work with the Government and the Civil Aviation Authority to ensure that the security aspects are implemented effectively and in consultation with all stakeholders. However, AICES members are concerned that express services have been incorporated into the information on services provisions, which they feel are not appropriate to the sector. First, express services operate in a different and a very competitive marketplace, and failure to provide the necessary information to their customers would simply result in those customers moving their account. It is a very fluid market indeed. As the Minister acknowledged in Committee, this is mainly a business-to-business sector rather than a business-to-consumer sector, which makes it very different from passenger traffic on airlines. In consequence, the level of regulation required is also very different. I know that the Minister has acknowledged this key difference in the sectors being regulated—between air passenger traffic and express—and it would be helpful to know whether she believes that the CAA shares her views. Secondly, as I said in Committee, Ofcom already has the relevant powers on the provision of information on express services under the enabling provisions of the Postal Services Act 2011. I was concerned about a possible duplication here. The enabling provisions under section 51 of the 2011 Act could further extend to cover under subsection (3)(d)"““the information that is to be made available by postal operators to users of their services about service standards and about the rights of those users””," and under subsection (3)(e)"““anything else appearing to OFCOM to be necessary to secure effective protection for those users.””" That is effectively duplicated in information terms in the Bill. Under this particular section, express services constitute postal operators. Ofcom has judged that there has been no market failure in the provision of information and that the powers in the Act are not required to be used at present. They are still there, however, so conferring the CAA with the same powers will lead to regulatory duplication. Existing legislation already provides for the required ““future-proofing”” that we talked about so much in Committee. Finally, but crucially, the express sector is different from air passenger traffic because the mode of transport is not relevant to the consumer. The key factor is the time required to get a package from A to B. How it gets there is completely irrelevant. Most of the time it will be done by air in this particular sector, but sometimes it will be done by truck—and sometimes, perhaps, on public transport. Obviously, the same cannot be said for air passengers unless they are unfortunate enough to land on the wrong runway at Heathrow and want to get to terminal 4. That fact means that the consumer would expect Ofcom, not the CAA, to be the relevant regulator. Making the CAA the regulator for the provision of information services in the express sector would be confusing, and unlikely to bring any benefits to consumers. I hope that the Minister will comment, will look again at the issue, and will perhaps even consider meeting me, along with representatives of the Association of International Courier & Express Services, to discuss the association's legitimate concerns.