Haulage Permits and Trailer Registration Bill [HL] — House of Lords, 2018-02-27
Topic: Mixed Topics
Elizabeth Sugg (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, as always, the experience and knowledge in this Chamber has been extremely insightful, and I thank all noble Lords for their contributions. Many noble Lords have pointed out the importance of the Bill to ensuring that there is no disruption to the haulage industry when we leave the EU, and of course I entirely agree. This is responsible planning to ensure that we are ready to deliver the outcome of the negotiations, whatever that may be. I think we all agree on our aim to retain the existing liberalised access for commercial haulage. I welcome that agreement; it may be one of the few that we have during the progress of the Bill I apologise that the Bill was not announced in the Queen’s Speech, as highlighted by the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, and the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson. The gracious Speech outlined that alongside the EU (Withdrawal) Bill there would be complementary legislation and that is what this is, but I apologise that it was not explicitly pointed out then Many noble Lords, including the noble Lords, Lord Bassam and Lord Teverson, asked about costs and fees for both haulage permits and trailer registration. As I said in my opening words, the Bill provides powers for the Government to set and charge the administration fee. We are consulting on the details of the fees and charges for haulage permitting later this year. Again, as I said, we are doing this in order to minimise any additional burdens and costs for business. We are fully aware that this is going to be a cost for large and smaller haulage firms. The fees will be in line with the current international permit schemes. The noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, asked for some examples. An ECMT permit for one year currently costs around £133 and a bilateral permit for one journey costs around £8, so that is the kind of ballpark figure that we are looking at. However, the exact nature and costs of the permit scheme will depend on the outcome of the negotiations, so we will be setting that out On the question of trailer registration, the Bill again provides the powers to set the fees to cover the administration. Again, we are aiming to minimise those as far as possible in order to reduce any burden or cost to businesses. There will be no ongoing annual fees associated with trailer registration. I think the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, asked about numbers; we expect around 80,000 or so will be registered. Once the trailer is registered, the only further fees would be for any subsequent reissue. The system for that is still in development and the cost is still to be determined. We have been doing quite a lot of exploratory work on this and are confident that the registration fee will be significantly below that of the current vehicle registration fee, which is £55. On caravans, a subject raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, the scheme will apply only to commercial trailers over 750 kilogrammes. We are speaking to the caravan society, as the noble Baroness mentioned, to further clarify that I raised the issue around horses and whether, if a horse was travelling to race abroad on a commercial basis, that would count. I was reassured that horses in that case would be in an all-in-one vehicle; I do not quite know what to call the vehicles, but they would not be in a trailer horsebox. My colleagues tell me that a horsebox is an all-in-one vehicle, rather than a horse trailer, so they would be covered. However, I am going to go back and clarify that further The noble Lord, Lord Bassam, asked about the permit application process and how it will work, and the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, mentioned HMRC. We are working with an existing organisation, the Driver & Vehicle Standards Agency, on the system to allocate haulage permits. That will be building on existing IT systems to create an online permit application system. Obviously hauliers are already familiar with applying to the DVSA for paperwork related to domestic and international travel, so we hope that they will welcome this. Again, we are committed to trying to minimise any additional requirements, and we are working closely with industry to develop those plans. The aim is absolutely that we will be able to take applications and issue permits in advance of exit day, and we are on track to be able to issue permits in late 2018.