Jesse Norman
MP for Hereford and South Herefordshire · Conservative · United Kingdom
“In view of the new Prime Minister’s spending priorities, it now seems highly unlikely that the ruinously expensive current plans will be put to the House before the end of this year. Seven months have already passed with no action.”
“10 North have real spending powers of its own? If the answer is yes, then this will be a new kind of cross-departmental Ministry—perhaps a territorial Ministry, like a regional Government but with no defined scope or mandate. We will need to see the legal instruments delegating Treasury authority and functions to it.”
“I rather fear that, given our longevity and at least the level of banter on the Government side of the Dispatch Box, we will be seen over time as the Morecambe and Wise, or perhaps the two Ronnies, of British politics.”
“The past few weeks have brought news of the deaths of Dolly Parton, Tim Curry and Wendell Berry. I am sure that many colleagues will share my sense of shock and sadness at the loss of those extraordinary figures, but also give great thanks for their lives. Truly, we live in a world of change.”
“10 North will not have spending power of its own, then ultimately the Treasury and the Chancellor will continue to sign off on its public spending and on any taxing matters. Decentralisation is really important, but No. 10 North will not be a means of decentralisation in this scenario; it will be just another layer of Government.”
“But we are not going to cast nasturtiums, in the words of a friend of mine, on any of this nonsense—not even on Baroness Lloyd and the hopeless Building Digital UK, who have entirely failed to address the issue of fibre broadband in neglected parts of my constituency and simply repeated the same language of incompetence and failure to me…”
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“Following its designation, the airports national policy statement was subject to a number of legal challenges, which have been heard in the High Court, the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court. The legal challenges concluded in December 2020, when the Supreme Court unanimously concluded that the airports national policy statement is lawful. Challenges against the statement, however, did not end there. The Planning Act 2008 requires the Secretary of State to review a national policy statement whenever they consider it appropriate to do so. Between 2019 and 2021, the Department received numerous requests from third parties to review it. When the Supreme Court determined that the airports national policy statement once again had legal effect, those review requests were considered.”
“The Government considered the commission’s recommendation and announced in October 2016 that they agreed with the conclusions. The Government then developed a draft airports national policy statement that provided the framework and criteria against which a development consent application would be judged. The draft statement was published for consultation in 2017 and scrutinised by the Transport Committee, before being laid before Parliament. In June 2018, the airports national policy statement was designated, following Parliament voting overwhelmingly in favour of the north-west runway proposal, by 415 votes to 119. That is an overwhelming majority in favour of the north-west runway proposal.”
“I do not have much time, but I think the Chamber knows that the funding per head and the sources of revenue that exist in London are vastly greater than in other parts of the country, and it is appropriate that that money should be properly invested alongside any other support that can be given. We are not going to be distracted from this important topic. On a more constructive point, it is noticeable that the Opposition’s position on the issue of Heathrow expansion is not so very different from that of the Government. It is important to explore what the Government’s position is. Hon. Members will recall that, in 2015, the independent Airports Commission’s final report concluded that a new north-west runway at Heathrow airport was the best solution to deliver the future additional airport capacity the country required.”
“I have no time, I am afraid. I have to stop in half a minute in order to allow the hon. Member for Putney to wind up the debate. I wish I had more time, but I am afraid that interventions and other speeches have not allowed for it. Turning quickly back to covid-19, Members will be aware that covid-19 drastically revised the use of air transport. Almost overnight, most of the country’s aircraft fleet was grounded. Thankfully, the UK is now on the way to recovery, but we have not yet returned to the demand before the pandemic, and uncertainty remains around the long-term impact that the pandemic has had on aviation demand. Further work therefore needs to be undertaken before any future forecasts can be developed. I think I had better wind up there. I apologise, Ms Elliott, for having to truncate my speech owing to the pressure of time.”
“Self-driving vehicles have the potential to reduce driver error and thereby improve road safety, which has plateaued over the last few years. Members will be aware that the Government recently consulted on establishing a safety ambition for self-driving vehicles to be equivalent to the driving of a competent and careful driver. In real terms, the effect of that would be that the self-driving vehicle would not drive stressed, aggressively or in a way that reflects fatigue on the part of the driver. It would not seek to take illegal shortcuts. It would not be inebriated at the wheel.”
“They potentially include connecting our rural communities, reducing isolation, providing better access to education and making it easier for people to see friends and family. Of course, autonomous last-mile delivery can help to deliver goods and services to people’s doors. All are attractive benefits of the realisation of the potential in the sector. If I may, I will touch on some of the benefits and then on some of the potential drawbacks that the Government are wrestling with. The first of these benefits is safety. Almost 90% of all recorded road accidents involve human error as a contributory factor. The most recent provisional figures, for the year ending June 2022, show that on average almost five people died on our roads every day. We must bring that number down.”
“To support the sector, the Government’s Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles has helped to secure £600 million in funding since 2015. In sharp contrast to the dismal description given by the Opposition Front-Bench spokesperson a few moments ago, this is a thoroughly thriving, technology-driven sector, in which the UK is a European and in many respects a global leader—but we need to continue to make it so. The point raised about legislation is absolutely right. As colleagues will recall from my testimony in front of the Transport Committee, I was as strong on that point there as I am today. There are tremendous benefits to be had, and not merely economic ones; it is good to focus on the social benefits, which hon. Members have touched on.”
“It is a delight to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Twigg. I am absolutely delighted to reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes North (Ben Everitt); I thank him for securing this debate on the social impact of autonomous last-mile delivery. How right he is to raise it as an important issue and I am grateful to all Members who have spoken in the debate. Only last week, I spoke to the Transport Committee about self-driving vehicles. The sector is potentially very large, and last-mile autonomous delivery will be just one part of it, and part of what we think of as the connected and automated mobility sector, which, if fully realised, could, it is estimated, have a potential market value of some £42 billion by 2035 and create 38,000 new skilled jobs.”
“I would like to suggest that the Rolling Stones be nominated as the band for the autonomous local transport sector because they brilliantly, in their work, cover both the strengths and the drawbacks of this technology. If successful, the technology is one that could make us happy. It can use these marvellous vehicles as a beast of burden. It allows them to operate at any time and therefore they can be midnight ramblers. Tragically, of course, you can’t always get what you want. Sometimes you are waiting on a friend. Indeed, it may be that you can’t hear these little machines knocking. Above all, we want to avoid being turned by them into a street fighting man, let alone suffering a 19th nervous breakdown. With that, let me take my seat. Thank you, Mr Twigg.”
“Again, that needs to be conducted with road safety as a key consideration. We therefore need to factor in both sides—the gains and the potential drawbacks—and proceed in a careful, consistent and carefully thought-through way, and that is what the Department is doing. Let me reassure Members that the need for legislation is well understood, but it is also important to ensure that it is a legislative framework set up to accommodate all these concerns as well as to maximise the potential benefit. I could not end this speech without referring to the brilliant idea from the Chair of the Transport Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Milton Keynes South (Iain Stewart), that there should be a further national competition, which I hope the Transport Committee will organise, for suitable tunes to be played. I think we can go one step further.”
“Finally, the Department is engaged with the question of cyber skills and works, as part of the national cyber strategy, with other Departments to ensure we have a proper cadre of cyber professionals in and alongside Government, as well as in the private sector. This technology has tremendous implications for cyber security. It is important to mention that it will potentially positively or negatively affect employment. Of course, there can be a threat to existing jobs from any new technology, but it has been projected that as many as 38,000 jobs could come from implementing this technology. That is a mixed blessing. In terms of remote driving, this is a slightly different technology. It is distinct from self-driving and automation, but it is a technology that potentially sits alongside self-driving technologies.”
“When we think about the safety of vehicles, we know that that will play a key role in acceptability because, as we have discussed, the public likes nothing less than the introduction of, or way of using, a technology that has potentially prejudicial safety effects. Of course, that means not just the vehicles, but any changes to infrastructure that may be required to make them work effectively. If we look more widely, there are concerns about cyber security with all autonomous vehicles, and small ones are no exception. The Department for Transport works closely with the National Cyber Security Centre to address that. We, as a nation, chair the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, and that has developed two new international regulations that focus on cyber security and software updates.”
“Finally, we have the positive impact that comes from improving the access people have to receiving goods at their home or business. That, too, is an important further advantage of this technology. However, we should also focus—the Government are under an obligation to do so—on some of the potential limitations. One has already been touched on, which is that there should be a proper measure of social consent with the introduction of this technology. It should be done in as careful a way as possible, but also in a way that is affordable, equitable, accessible and safe. All those are metrics that could lose public support if they were breached. It is therefore important to adhere to and respect each of those important values.”
“It is right to focus on the safety case, but it is also right to look at the issue of emissions and net zero, where there is significant potential for autonomous last-mile delivery vehicles to make an impact. That could be through being modern vehicles that have zero tailpipe emissions by 2030, in line with the Government’s policy. It could come through the use of more efficient and better optimised routes between the starting point and the destination, as well as more efficient automated driving styles. It could come through the right sizing of vehicles, as I have touched on. The development of custom-made vehicles can help increase vehicle utilisation, and that should reduce the impact on carbon emissions overall because it creates greater productivity and use from an existing trip.”
“I thank my hon. Friend for his kind invitation. I would be delighted to come up to Milton Keynes to see the fabulous autonomous last-mile delivery vehicles in operation. They represent a very interesting technology, and we are very interested in that. I am pleased to say that my predecessor was able to visit last year, and I will certainly aim to do so. Let me touch on a couple of other aspects that are useful to reflect on. One is the importance of using vehicles that are appropriately sized and designed for a specific task, thereby reducing the effects of collision from vehicles that are potentially overly large for what is required. These small autonomous vehicles are an example of that.”
“Taken together, this programme of activity aims to allow an increased number of long-distance services to operate between York and Newcastle. I hope that these planned funding commitments will provide reassurance to the hon. Lady and to other Members that the Government are acutely aware of the strategic importance of the east coast main line. The Department looks forward to continuing its engagement with the hon. Lady and the all-party parliamentary group on the east coast main line, and to engaging with the new APPG that has been unveiled for the first time today, as these ambitious plans come to maturity. I very much thank her for securing this debate. Question put and agreed to .”
“The Department has provided Network Rail with early-stage development funding to consider how these plans can be delivered as efficiently as possible in order to deliver maximum value for money to the taxpayer. I am delighted to be able to confirm that improvements towards the north of the east coast main line are at a more developed stage of maturity and that they can and will act as early examples of the Government’s commitment to delivering on the aspirations of the integrated rail plan to improve the experience of passengers on the route. They include a package of enhancements at Darlington and York stations, as well as infrastructure upgrades at various other locations between Northallerton and Newcastle.”
“These plans aim to achieve further upgrades and improvements to line speeds, as well as upgrades to the power supply to allow for longer and more frequent trains, and to increase capacity on the route north of York. That would mean that journey times from London to Newcastle would be reduced by over 20 minutes compared to today and that those to York and Darlington would be reduced by around 15 minutes. A 20-minute journey time improvement would also be achieved for passengers travelling between London and Leeds. Passengers will also benefit from an increased number of seats, as well as from improved performance and reliability—unions permitting. It is envisaged that these improvements will be delivered in three separate tranches of upgrades, starting in the mid-2020s and running up to the late 2030s.”
“Approximately two thirds of signalling equipment on the southern section of the line is reaching its life expiry date and needs to be replaced. The east coast digital programme covers the section of the east coast main line running from King’s Cross to just south of Grantham and is the UK’s flagship digital signalling initiative, aiming to deliver a safer, more reliable and more resilient route. To date, the Government have committed more than £1 billion for the programme, which is expected to be delivered by the early 2030s. To pick up the point the hon. Lady raised about the integrated rail plan, Members present will be aware of ambitious commitments for further east coast main line upgrades that are included in the integrated rail plan, which was published in November 2021.”
“This had been scheduled for introduction in 2022 but was deferred to ensure that the views of passengers and local leaders, which were being captured through the public consultation, were fully considered. There is work under way at the moment with train operators to finalise the specification of a revised timetable that much more closely aligns with the views of stakeholders across the line of the route and that ensures that the running of the railway is fairer to the taxpayer. I know that there is every intention to deliver that revised timetable as soon as possible. The east coast main line is due to be the first major route in the UK to benefit from digital signalling, which is another issue that the hon. Lady rightly mentioned.”
“That investment was delivered in conjunction with the £2.7 billion intercity express programme, which saw the roll-out of state-of-the-art Azuma trains across the east coast main line, with the last trains coming on to the route in September 2020. Each train in the new fleet has around 15% greater capacity than previous units and provides a significant change in accessibility, through increased numbers of wheelchair spaces and improved wi-fi and mobile connectivity. The full benefits for passengers of both these significant pieces of investment will be realised, as the hon. Lady rightly recognises, only through the introduction of a new and recast timetable for the route.”
“Lady recognised, have seen £1.2 billion spent on improvements across the route. That funding has delivered upgrades to track, platforms, signalling and junctions across the east coast main line, as well as essential improvements to the power supply. Specific examples of projects included in this wider programme of work include new platforms at Doncaster and Stevenage stations, improvements to the track layout at King’s Cross and a new rail junction at Werrington, near Peterborough. The planning and delivery of such a wide-ranging set of upgrades was the result of close collaboration between the Department, Network Rail and the train and freight operating companies. As the hon. Lady appreciates, these are invariably complex matters.”
“I am not going to do that, but I will say that I have no doubt that he will be scrutinising the proceedings in this Chamber very carefully and that he will want to act on them with his usual energy and dispatch. Of course, as the hon. Lady mentioned, we have had an opportunity, in this discussion, to consider one of the most important rail arteries in this country. I am delighted to be able to set out the Government’s position and to respond to many of the issues that she touched on, including the integrated rail plan, timetabling and digital signalling. Let me start by highlighting the east coast enhancements programme, which began in 2014. The Department and Network Rail are now in the very final stages of delivering that package of investment. When it is completed in 2024, it will, as the hon.”
“It will not have escaped notice that, as she pointed out, I am not the Rail Minister, but of course, as she will also know, we try to play total football in the Department for Transport—if Neeskens is going in one direction, we want Cruyff to be heading off in the other one, and we try to do the same thing. At this moment, the Rail Minister is about to get on a train—on the east coast main line—to York to conduct an official visit. I hope the hon. Lady will recognise that commitment to the piece of infrastructure that she nobly champions. Nothing would be easier to do in his absence than the classic ministerial two-step of stitching him up by offering a meeting on his behalf.”
“I would like to offer my thanks to the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North (Catherine McKinnell) for securing this debate and for all the efforts and advocacy she has put into pressing the argument for investment in the east coast main line, in her role as chair of the all-party parliamentary group on the east coast main line. I am thrilled to hear the news from my hon. Friend the Member for Sedgefield (Paul Howell) about the creation of his own APPG, which feels like a very positive development as well. I must, as the hon. Member for Newcastle upon Tyne North noted, extend my apologies on one front.”
“Good morning to you, Sir. The jet zero strategy was published in July 2022, and sets out the Government’s approach to decarbonising UK aviation. The strategy focuses on the rapid development of technologies in a way that maintains the benefits of air travel while also maximising the opportunities that decarbonisation brings for the UK.”
“How extremely kind of the hon. Lady to extend that very interesting invitation. I would accept in a flash except that I do not want to usurp the prerogative of my colleague in the House of Lords, so maybe I can pick up with her. I am very interested to hear what the hon. Lady said and very grateful for the update. I will ask my officials to look closely at that.”
“The Government are committed to supporting the introduction of 4,000 zero-emission buses and a zero-emission bus fleet. As the roads Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for North West Durham (Mr Holden), said, he has focused on sustainable public transport recently in a visit to Scotland, which included meetings with the traffic commissioner in Glasgow and Lothian Buses.”
“The Government are on track to deliver the policy. As the hon. Gentleman will be aware, we are working with companies to build substantial supply chains that then have to scale up by several orders of magnitude in order to meet the scale of orders. If we look at the number that have been ordered alone: for zero emission bus regional areas, the ZEBRA scheme, 1,342; 275 for Coventry; 20 will be going to Cambridgeshire in the next few weeks, I am pleased to say; and 350 to other schemes in England outside London. The total so far is 3,429, which is well on track to meet our target.”
“One can take that as a comment either about buses or about the size of my right hon. Friend’s lawnmower—let us assume that it is about buses. I thank him for his interest and I am certainly happy to discuss that further with him.”
“I congratulate my hon. Friend on the brilliant work he has done on apprenticeships in Harrogate and Knaresborough over the last few years. I note that some 12,430 new apprenticeships have been created there since 2010. As he knows, the Department is committed to working with the transport industry to create high-quality apprenticeships so that the sector has the skilled workforce it needs. I work closely with the transport employment and skills taskforce to see what we can do to promote apprenticeships still further in the industry.”
“As my hon. Friend knows, the Department for Education published fresh guidance last year on how apprenticeship training can be delivered flexibly to fit business needs. My hon. Friend the Member for North West Durham (Mr Holden), the Roads Minister, has been to talk to him and, I believe, has visited the classroom in Harrogate with him, so he can take it from us that we are very much seized of the issue of flexibility and the importance of improving it.”
“I am sure that the hon. Gentleman meant to begin his question by congratulating the Government on the zero-emission vehicle mandate and our new investments in the local electric vehicle infrastructure scheme. The effect of that, of course, is precisely to create the further investment that will itself drive private sector demand for apprenticeships. We are certainly working as hard as we can on our side, along with the transport employment and skills taskforce, to ensure that we meet this increased demand.”
“I thank my hon. Friend for that; he has been a great champion of this cause. I absolutely join him in praising Joe Skinner. Let me also praise Cameron Wood in my constituency, who has been equally hard-working in pressing the case for the improvement of disabled access. I know that my hon. Friend has already met the buses Minister, whom I know is keen to get up to Burnley—I would be very supportive of that.”
“The Government are spending £3 billion on this area over the current spending period. Active Travel England is making an enormous difference to the quality of schemes throughout England. Significant amounts of money are going in through the levelling-up fund and through City Region Sustainable Transport Settlements and other schemes, so we believe that we are on track to meet our targets.”
“For example, through the safer roads fund, we have invested in schemes to make our 50 most dangerous roads safer. All those schemes are complete or under way and, over the next 20 years, those improvements alone are expected to save 1,500 lives. We also completed the biggest overhaul of the highway code in decades in 2022, so that vulnerable road users such as pedestrians and cyclists have priority in certain situations. The Department is working on a road safety strategic frame- work, and the aim is to have it published this spring. Based on a “safe system” approach, it will consider what might be appropriate to support performance indicators on casualty reduction.”
“Friend will know, Active Travel England was launched in August 2022 to work with local authorities to develop and deliver new high-quality walking and cycling infrastructure schemes. ATE is an executive agency of the Department, based in York. One of its core functions is to drive up the quality of new walking and cycling schemes, and to provide local authorities with the right skills to deliver them. ATE will review the quality of designs at bid stage, design stage and after construction. It is already proving to be a valuable resource where there are local concerns about safety. In general, the Government take, as I have said, road safety extremely seriously. Reducing the numbers of those needlessly killed and injured on our roads is a crucial priority. The Department continues to make progress in that area.”
“The role of my Department is to set an overarching Government policy, and provide an enabling framework of legislation, guidance and advice. But of course we take a serious interest in issues of road safety for all road users. Because of that overall remit, we have no brief to intervene in matters of local democratic decision making. Decisions on what traffic management measures to provide are entirely a matter for local authorities, in accordance with local democratic procedures. Successive Governments have made it clear that they want cycling and walking to be a natural first choice for shorter journeys, and the Government have set out an ambitious vision that, by 2030, half of all journeys in towns and cities should be cycled or walked. Accordingly, as my right hon.”
“I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox) on securing the debate, and on the wonderful, almost idyllic, picture of Clevedon seafront that he painted at the start of his remarks. As he will know, managing traffic on local roads is and always has been a matter for local traffic authorities. They have a range of duties, powers and responsibilities, and a considerable toolkit of measures at their disposal to achieve that. Specifically, local highway authorities have a duty under section 16 of the Traffic Management Act 2004 to manage their roads so as to secure the expeditious movement of all traffic, which, it is important to say, includes pedestrians and cyclists. Balancing the different needs of road users with the many and varied demands on roads is complex.”
“Authorities should also be open to making changes to any scheme in the light of further experience and real world feedback. The requirement to monitor and engage with local people therefore does not end with the apparent completion of construction work on a scheme. Let me close by saying that I am very thankful to my right hon. Friend for raising this important local issue on the Floor of the House of Commons and on the public record. ATE will be inspecting the scheme as part of the normal review process, and the Department will continue to focus on safety and the improvement of safety for all road users now and in future. Question put and agreed to .”
“On engagement and consultation, it is true that any scheme must be developed and implemented after thorough engagement with the community affected. The Department has made that extremely clear. It appears, as I understand it, that North Somerset Council did carry out some public engagement on the proposals. It is important to say that objective methods should be used to establish a genuinely representative picture of local views and to ensure that minority views do not dominate a proper consultation process. Engagement should not end when a scheme is introduced. Authorities should continue to monitor how schemes are performing and make changes if they are required. I notice that some changes have already been made to the scheme.”
“As I understand it, some remedial work has already taken place on the scheme, although it may not be clear yet what changes will be made finally to the scheme as a whole. Although the Department has no powers to halt or remove the scheme, and ATE does not have powers to compel local authorities to make changes to active travel schemes, they are absolutely in a position to record non-compliance on design and safety issues that have been identified. Those then can, in the normal way, become the subject of public debate, local review, and any actions or reactions through proper local democratic processes. Design review outcomes will in turn inform assessments of the capability of local authorities, which in turn will have a material impact on future funding for schemes.”
“The Department was not approached about these markings and has not authorised them. I note with some concern that the RAC said: “This is one of the most bizarre new road schemes we’ve ever seen” and went on to say the “new wavy road markings could accidentally prove to be a road safety risk”. It seems to me that the RAC is independently validating my right hon. Friend’s concerns. If they are a safety hazard, of course that is a matter to be taken extremely seriously, not just locally but by Active Travel England and the Department as it considers the wider picture on road safety. I reassure the House and my right hon. Friend that ATE will be arranging an inspection of the scheme as part of its regular review programme. That will also consider safety issues, such as those that have been highlighted in this debate.”
“It received funding through the second tranche of the active travel fund, which is designed to build out priority routes that could serve as core parts of longer-term local cycling and walking networks, including direct walking and cycling routes, road crossings, safer junctions, school streets, cycle parking, segregated cycle lanes and other such schemes. I want to be clear that a number of the schemes that were made permanent from earlier emergency active travel schemes have been modified or replaced following processes of formal consultation and design review. On the subject of the wiggly lines, it is important to say that any road markings installed by local authorities must either comply with the Traffic Signs Regulations and General Directions 2016, or be specially authorised by the Secretary of State.”
“My right hon. Friend is absolutely right. In setting out the general framework of policy, I have yet to come to a specific discussion of the situation in Clevedon, but the elderly people he describes will themselves be pedestrians as they make the final part of their journey to the seafront, and their safety, too, must absolutely be part of an overall framework that respects their wellbeing and health. Local authorities have a statutory duty under the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 to ensure the safe movement of all traffic. They are responsible for ensuring the infrastructure they provide, including for walking and cycling, is safe and fit for purpose. As my right hon. Friend highlighted, the scheme is apparently intended to improve the public realm on Clevedon’s seafront.”
“Last March, the Government published their electric vehicle infrastructure strategy, which set out plans to accelerate the roll-out of the network. We expect at least 300,000 public charge points to be installed across the UK by 2030. There are already over 37,000 open-access public chargers on UK roads, with more than 600 new chargers added to our road network each month on average, and public charging devices have more than tripled in the past four years. That is in addition to the hundreds of thousands of charge points in homes and workplaces. We believe that we are on track to meet local expectations.”
“Since 2020, the Government have funded an estimated 3,452 zero-emission buses across the UK, some 1,400 of which have been supported by funding from the zero-emission bus regional areas, which has rightly been highlighted. Great progress has been made, with more than 500 buses ordered so far under the ZEBRA scheme, including 117 electric buses that have been ordered for four different local authorities, as announced in the House last week. Buses are not the only zero-emission vehicles on our roads. It is right to think about the question of zero-emission vehicles more widely, as well as the charging infrastructure network, mentioned by several colleagues, that needs to be as accessible, affordable and secure in rural areas as elsewhere.”
“The scheme in Essex has been electrified since day one, providing a zero-emission demand-responsive service to rural areas around Braintree, and Surrey County Council has started to roll out its electric minibus route on its Mole Valley connect service. On buses more broadly, colleagues will know that, in 2020, we committed to introducing 4,000 zero-emission buses and, ultimately, to achieving an all zero-emission bus fleet. It is nice to hear the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) rightly supporting the superb achievements of Wrightbus in Northern Ireland with regard to not just electrification, but its work on the Hydroliner, using hydrogen technology. The approach to zero-emission buses will support our climate ambitions, improve transport for local communities and support green jobs across the country.”
“The Department has made sure that the services use accessible minibuses and can still be booked through a website or with a phone call so that no one is excluded from using them. As the hon. Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) pointed out, demand-responsive services are not the perfect solution to every challenge. Other schemes need to be trialled, and have been, but have proven not to be sustainable. A balance needs to be struck between providing a useful service that is responsive and frequent and running too much mileage cost-ineffectively, with too few passengers. That is why it is so important that each scheme should participate in a detailed monitoring and evaluation process, so that the Department can learn about the most effective approaches. Some of the pilots use zero-emission vehicles.”
“However, I recognise that it can be challenging to provide conventional bus services for rural areas, which have widely dispersed populations and consequent travel patterns that are hard to cover effectively. That is why demand-responsive services, which have been discussed today, can be used in some places to meet their needs, and work is under way to assess whether that can be more effective than traditional public transport solutions. Colleagues will be aware of the £20 million rural mobility fund, which supports 17 innovative demand-led minibus trials in rural areas. They use app-based technologies so that passengers can book a journey through their smartphone, and intelligent software then works out the right route to pick up and drop off passengers, given the demand.”