Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)

My Lords, Amendment 9 from the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, requires authorities to publish a statement outlining their objectives, reasons and supporting evidence. My department has established franchising guidance to support authorities through the franchising process. Requiring local authorities to provide an upfront statement is redundant as at that point franchising is still in the exploratory stage, making the statement premature. The franchising scheme assessment provides a robust way to present the evidence and rationale behind a decision to franchise. While local authorities might choose to develop a feasibility assessment to start with, this should remain optional to allow them the flexibility to adopt the approach that best suits their needs. The amendment undermines recent efforts by my department to streamline franchising, making it faster and more cost-effective. I believe the amendment is unnecessary and I hope the noble Lord will withdraw it. Amendment 12 seeks to impose a five-year moratorium on repeating franchising scheme assessments if the previous attempt was unsuccessful. The aim of this Bill is to simplify the process for authorities wishing to pursue franchising, ensuring decisions are made at the appropriate level and in a timely manner. I would contend that this amendment introduces unnecessary constraints on local transport authorities by proposing and adopting an overly rigid approach. Many factors might lead an authority to initially decide against pursuing franchising, only to reconsider later. Imposing a blanket restriction limits the ability to respond flexibly to evolving conditions and opportunities. Assessments are costly and time-consuming, so they will not be undertaken lightly. The noble Lord referred to a change of control, which might happen more frequently than five years, which is one possibility. Another possibility is that commercial bus services in the area, presumably served by an enhanced partnership, change over time, so that franchising becomes, in the local transport authority’s view, the best way of dealing with bus services in the locality. Since bus operators can give but 42 days’ notice of quite radical changes to bus services, including large-scale withdrawals, it would be extraordinarily unfortunate to have a situation where a commercial bus company had given notice on quite a large number of services and the local transport authority found itself unable to propose a franchising scheme as a consequence in any reasonable time. For those reasons, I would say that the amendment is unnecessary and I hope the noble Lord will not move it.