FURTHER PROVISIONS AS TO CHARGING OF TOLLS (Hansard, 22 May 1991)

§ Mr. Freeman
I beg to move amendment No. 31, in page 8, line 44, leave out from beginning to end of line 3 on page 9 and insert— 993

'(a) a police vehicle, identifiable as such by writing or markings on it or otherwise by its appearance, if being used for police purposes;

(b) an ambulance as defined in section 4(2) of the Vehicles (Excise) Act 1971;

(c) a fire engine as so defined;

(d) a vehicle exempt from duty under that Act by virtue of—
section 4(1)(g) of that Act (invalid carriages), section 4(1)(kb) of that Act (vehicles used for carriage of disabled persons by recognised bodies), or section 7(2) of that Act (vehicles used by or for purposes of disabled person).'.

§ Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Harold Walker)
With this it will be convenient to consider the following amendments:
No. 36, in page 9, line 3, at end insert— '(c) a vehicle diverted on to the concession road by a police constable.'. Government amendments Nos. 32, 78 and 79.

§ Mr. Freeman
I can be brief because the hon. Gentleman to whom I would have been responding, the hon. Member for Leyton (Mr. Cohen), is not in his place. Therefore, I shall record briefly that the amendments seek to provide, as we all wish, free passage for police vehicles, ambulances, fire engines, invalid carriages and vehicles used for the carriage on toll roads of disabled persons by recognised bodies which, of course, are exempt from vehicle excise duty.
Individual toll orders could add additional categories, if that were appropriate. Amendment No. 32 and the equivalent Scottish amendment No. 79 essentially provide that the design of the toll routes should facilitate the free and unimpeded passage of these vehicles. These are uncontroversial amendments and I hope that they will be accepted.

§ Ms. Walley
The main Government amendments are obvious, and we cannot understand why their provisions were not in the Bill. However, we are glad to welcome them. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Leyton (Mr. Cohen) for pursuing the matter in Committee.
We share the concern about safety which we understand has been expressed by the West Midlands police authority, whose general purposes committee thinks that the Bill should be amended to reflect the right of the police to direct traffic to toll roads in cases of emergency or other appropriate need without penalty to the drivers of the vehicles so directed. I understand that that view is shared by the Greater Manchester police authority.
It is clear from the west midlands example that concesson roads could be designed to provide an alternative route for traffic that is currently using motorways. Does the Minister share our concern about that? In the interests of public safety, does he agree with the amendment?

§ Mr. Freeman
My hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough (Mr. Fry) also spoke in Committee to amendment No. 36. I understand the arguments in favour of the amendment, but I am not sympathetic to them because, as I hope I explained to members of the Committee, the police powers on roads are negative, not positive. At present the police cannot direct a motorist to use another road, although they can tell him that he cannot go any further because there has been an accident 994 or a fire. I do not want to amend the general law on police powers on roads. I hope that common sense will prevail when an accident occurs on a toll road. In any case, the hon. Lady knows that traffic often reverses down the carriageway of a motorway. Perhaps the hon. Lady is thinking about the M6 and the Birmingham northern relief road. If there is a major accident, there are well-established procedures for reversing traffic safely to the nearest exit point.
I do not envisage that it will present a practical problem. To the extent that it presents a hypothetical problem, the common sense of the owners of the toll roads—the concessionaires—will mean that in practice they will permit traffic on to the toll road if there is a dire emergency. If the accident occurs just before the entrance to a toll road, I hope—and all reasonable people would hope—that that traffic would be allowed on to the toll road.