Transport Levying Bodies (Amendment) Regulations 2018 — House of Lords, 2018-05-01
Topic: Transportation
Elizabeth Sugg (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I thank noble Lords for their general welcome—I think—for these regulations. The noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, mentioned the differing views on transport needs in the area. Of course, that will be the case in any combined authority covering different cities and, indeed, rural areas. The noble Baroness spoke about the challenges there. That is the point of having a local transport plan drawn up by the combined authority, which will be responsible for ensuring that the plans are co-ordinated across all the areas it represents On the monitoring of the levy by the department, of course we engage with the combined authorities regularly to monitor their transport spending. As with local authorities, they are required to justify their spending as part of the budgetary process On whether the levy amount is constrained, it will provide the funding as agreed in the devolution deal and as conferred by Parliament. The levy is set in agreement with the local authorities, so they are consulted as part of the budget-setting process. It provides a fallback in the event of disagreement to ensure that the combined authority can continue to deliver transport functions in the future On the local transport plan, which will take into account the differing needs—and the innovative ideas of the mayor—the combined authority will produce and publish a local transport plan in accordance with its devolution scheme. It has not done so yet but, as an interim measure, in June last year the combined authority board agreed to adopt the previous local transport plans of Cambridgeshire County Council and Peterborough City Council as a single local transport plan. In addition, the combined authority has taken over the role of local transport authority from all its different constituent authorities to determine, manage and deliver the mayor’s strategic transport plans, as well as integrated public transport networks for the region. All the constituent councils that I spoke about in my introduction are represented on the board of the combined authority On working with strategic partners, be it Highways England or Network Rail, the combined authority has not yet set out a transport plan but if it is part of the strategic roads network, for example, Highways England will work closely with the combined authority and the mayor, as Network Rail and the train operating companies will do in the case of rail On the concern about democratic accountability, it might be helpful if I set out how that accountability will work. The combined authority requires a two-thirds majority vote to agree the levy, subject to the majority votes of Cambridgeshire County Council and Peterborough City Council. There is of course direct democratic accountability with its directly elected mayor, who will be held accountable, and the elected leaders of the constituent councils, who all sit on the board. The levy will fall only on the two upper-tier authorities and this proposed approach was agreed by the combined authority in November 2017, so there is democratic oversight of the funding requirement that the combined authority will seek. I hope I have reassured the noble Lord on that point The provision of these powers to the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority is an example of our commitment to devolving powers to metropolitan mayors, which will result in the improved delivery of local transport. They will of course be democratically accountable to those people who use that local transport. By placing the funding stream from its two constituent authorities into statute, the combined authority and its elected mayor will have its ability to raise a levy strengthened and can use this funding to take strategic decisions on transport investments across the region. I thank noble Lords for their contributions.