HC Deb 23 February 1987 vol 111 cc11-2
13. Mr. Beith

asked the Secretary of State for Transport when he expects to receive the first report of the research he has commissioned into the effects of bus deregulations in rural areas; and if he proposes to publish the report.

Mr. David Mitchell

I hope to publish first reports of the studies of selected areas in the summer. All the evidence available so far indicates that the level of rural bus services has been broadly maintained.

Mr. Beith

In view of that reply, does the Minister not realise that the main bus operator in Northumberland reduced services by 25,000 miles a week in the aftermath of deregulation and that very few of those services were taken up by other operators? Must the public wait for the publication of all this research before some of the gaps are filled, and must people give up jobs because they are unable to get to work in the meantime?

Mr. Mitchell

Most counties have made such savings by going over to competitive tendering for the provision of socially necessary services and they have adequate resources to provide all the services that are necessary in rural areas.

Mr. Speller

Is my hon. Friend aware that, contrary to what was said by the hon. Member for Berwick upon Tweed (Mr. Beith), in the west country and in north Devon in particular the deregulation of rural buses has resulted in the appearance of buses where none had been seen for more than a decade and that that has been entirely welcomed by my constituents?

Mr. Mitchell

I am aware that that is so not just in Devon but in many other parts of the country.

Mr. Heffer

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the Crosville bus company, which is responsible for both rural and city bus services on Merseyside, has been purchasing bad second-hand buses from Birmingham which its employees have refused to drive? Is he aware that those workers have been sacked and are now unemployed purely as a result of the Government's deregulation policy?

Mr. Mitchell

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for raising that point. It should perhaps be more widely known that Crosville, having won a large number of contracts that would have provided additional employment at the Love Lane depot, took in 10 second-hand buses which in the previous few weeks had been used on the roads and had been driven in the Birmingham area by Transport and General Workers Union drivers, but that when that opportunity was obtained for Liverpool the men refused to drive the buses. The hon. Gentleman may care to ponder why buses which were perfectly satisfactory when driven on the roads of Birmingham by TGWU drivers should be unacceptable in Liverpool.

Mr. Robert Hughes

Surely the real evidence shows that there has been a severe disruption of bus services in the rural areas. Will the Minister define what he means by "broadly maintained", and will he now name the selected areas in respect of which the studies will be published?

Mr. Mitchell

The selected areas in England for the special studies are west Wiltshire, Blackburn, the Medway towns and Nottingham. In Scotland they are parts of the Highland region, north-east Fife, the Dumfries and Galloway regions, parts of Strathclyde and part of Edinburgh. In Wales they are west Glamorgan, parts of Powys and parts of Clwyd. All the evidence so far shows that with minor variations there is broadly the same level of service as before, but with an increasing provision of minibus sevices, which are highly popular.