HL Deb 16 May 1985 vol 463 cc1306-10

6.58 p.m.

Lord Brabazon of Tara rose to move, That the draft order laid before the House on 22nd April be approved. [20th Report from the Joint Committee.]

The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg to move that the draft order standing in my name on the Order Paper be approved.

The draft order serves two main purposes: first, it will provide additional protection for purchasers of liquid fuels, such as central heating oils and petroleum, by ensuring that they are given documentary evidence of deliveries; and, secondly, it will assist enforcement authorities to pursue allegations of fraud or short measure deliveries. It also means that the order will introduce documentation requirements for liquid fuel similar to those already in force for the carriage by road of solid fuel which are set out in the Weights and Measures Act 1963.

For safety reasons the loading, transport and unloading of liquid fuel takes place in a closed environment. This means that purchasers have no opportunity physically to inspect the product they are buying to check the quantity delivered. At the same time the increasingly high price of liquid fuel has provided incentives for the unscrupulous to perpetrate fraud. The target for this fraud is often public utilities or the absent householder. And this has caused concern to local authorities and led to complaints from consumers.

The primary purpose of the order is to remedy this unsatisfactory situation. If approved by your Lordships, the order will greatly reduce the incentive for fraud by requiring documents to be carried on a road tanker showing the quantity of fuel loaded at the depot at the beginning of every journey and, where known, its intended destination and the quantities ordered. Documentary evidence will also have to be left with each buyer showing the quantity actually delivered and copies will have to be retained by the driver throughout the journey. This will make it considerably easier than at present for enforcement authorities to follow up allegations of misdeliveries.

Since 1981 three rounds of consultations on the order have been undertaken with some 46 organisations representing the oil industry, road transport operators, distributors, consumer organisations and local authority enforcement interests. In drafting the order we have been concerned to ensure that the documentation requirements should not impose an undue burden on any of the interests involved. Nor should they require the duplication of information which is already required for other purposes or interfere unnecessarily with operational methods. In compiling the proposals we have not therefore stipulated that the information should be provided in any specific way. Instead we have set out a description of the information required, leaving it to the interested parties to decide how that information should be provided.

In summary therefore these relatively simple documentation requirements will enable the enforcement authorities to see at a glance the quantity of fuel loaded on to the tanker at the start of the journey; the quantity that has already been delivered; and what fuel should therefore remain on board.

I am fully aware that the documentation requirements proposed in the order are unlikely by themselves to deter the unscrupulous trader. However when they are taken together with the existing technical regulations which have been in operation for the past two years which control the use of the measuring equipment actually used for dispensing fuel from road tankers, I believe they will greatly reduce the prospect of frauds remaining undetected.

Finally, I am sure your Lordships will wish to know that this order was considered by the Joint Committee on Statutory Instruments but the Committee did not draw the special attention of your Lordships' House to it.

My Lords, I commend the draft order.

Moved, That the draft order laid before the House on 22nd April be approved. [20th Report from the Joint Committee.]—(Lord Brabazon of Tara.)

Lord Bruce of Donington

My Lords, we on this side are grateful to the noble Lord for having given an explanation of this order. Perhaps I may say at the outset that the information the noble Lord has given your Lordships' House is somewhat more extensive than that given by the Government in another place when discussing this order before the Standing Committee concerned.

The first question I have to ask the noble Lord concerning this order, which is just now coming into operation, is: what has happened before? It is a rather long time since the Weights and Measures Act 1963, and the thought immediately occurred that it is some 22 years later that this regulation has been introduced. What has been happening over the past 22 years since the passing of the Act that suddenly propels the department into action to produce a regulation of some five pages? I have one or two small questions to ask the noble Lord in relation to the text, but it would be useful to know what arrangements we should infer in the absence of any evidence that things have been swimming along quite merrily over the past 22 years. Fuel has been delivered by tanker between depots and to various individuals for quite a long time now. From what the noble Lord has said (and I can only judge from the basis of what the noble Lord said), in 1981 it must have emerged from some pigeon hole somewhere in the Ministry and somebody decided, "We must have a regulation covering the whole matter". So here it is.

Does the noble Lord consider that the regulation as now drafted, which has a simple purpose, is in simple terms which can be readily understood by all those involved, including, presumably, the drivers? Since the noble Lord, Lord Belstead, during the debate on the previous order before your Lordships ventured to quote Burdens on Business, I shall also quote from Burdens on Business, at paragraph 6.1. It reads: We found that in its length and complexity most Government literature on requirements is self-defeating. Managers simply do not have the time to absorb the volume of written guidance and instruction showered upon them". This is what they told the Government. I ask the noble Lord to look through this five-page regulation and to inform the House whether he can honestly say that this is the most simple way of conveying what he succeeded in conveying with the utmost clarity in the course of his opening remarks. In particular, if one considers Article 3(1) one sees that it reads: If the road tanker is carrying any liquid fuel for delivery to a buyer in pursuance of, or of an agreement for, a sale, or in contemplation of a sale, there shall be"— this that and the other.

Then at paragraph 4(1) it reads: If all or any of the liquid fuel on the road tanker is being carried in such circumstances that Article 3 above does not apply"— then certain other things shall happen.

The detailed question I wish to ask the noble Lord is: what are the circumstances referred to in Article 4 to which Article 3 does not apply? Also, in its various paragraphs this order refers to documents from which there may be readily ascertainable the quantity of each type of liquid fuel. The word "quantity" appears at various other parts of the regulation. What it does not specify, so far as I can see, are the units of measurement that are to be disclosed. Are they to be in gallons and pints or in litres? It simple does not say. There are regulations within my knowledge that specify that on petrol pumps, for example, both have to be disclosed, but there is no mention of the units of quantity which are to be disclosed on these documents. They might vary. We should like the noble Lord's advice on that.

The regulations say: If any provision of this Article is contravened without reasonable cause, any person who sells, agrees to sell or has in his possession for sale the liquid fuel shall be guilty of an offence". The question I have to ask is: who is to enforce this regulation? Are the police able to stop vehicles and make the inquiries? Are there to be special enforcement officers in the various districts to which this applies? Are they to be mobile and to turn up at various points in the journey to monitor what has happened up to date? How is the regulation to be enforced? It would be interesting to know, and in view of the noble Lord's predictions about manpower it would be interesting to know whether any extra enforcement personnel will be required. These are all questions to which I am sure the noble Lord will be able to give an answer.

Finally, I must draw the attention of the House to the fact that this five-page order is priced at £1.35. I have done some diligent research into this matter, as your Lordships might expect, and I find that the cost to the public of a five-page order in the year 1979 when this Government came into office was some 35 pence. It only needs a rapid calculation to observe that the price of this order of five pages has increased by 350 per cent in the course of the noble Lord's period in office.

During that time the RPI shows an increase of between 65 and 70 per cent.—that is the increase in prices which the country has enjoyed in general under the Conservative Government. How is it that a wretched little bit of paper like this costs so much more than it cost in 1979? These statutory instruments have to be bought by people whom they affect. We are supposed, in British law, to operate on the principle that ignorance of the law is no excuse. Therefore, hundreds of people will be buying this ridiculously overpriced piece of paper in order that they may acquaint themselves with the law. Incidentally, this applies also to copies of Hansard, covering the proceedings of your Lordships' House, except that the increase there is 333 per cent. since 1979 and in this case it is 350 per cent., whereas the general increase in the cost of living is between 64 and 65 per cent.

May I suggest that in addition to consulting themselves about the desirability of issuing legislation of this kind at all, which has to be enforced and which the country has done without for some 22 years, the Government could apply themselves far more usefully to other matters that need more urgent attention? This is not to say that we on this side of the House disagree with the principle, but we think it could have been more simply expressed. We think that the document itself could have been priced very much lower than it is.

The Government have captive buyers, because people have got to buy the order to ensure that they themselves comply with the law. So, in general, although we do not dissent from this and although we observe always that an affirmative resolution of the House is invariably required on non-controversial matters whereas the negative procedure is always adopted when a matter of controversy is involved, which seems a little peculiar, we thank the noble Lord. Of course we shall not resist the passing of the Motion which the noble Lord has so ably moved.

7.12 p.m.

Lord Brabazon of Tara

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Bruce of Donington, for his reception of the order. He has asked a number of questions which I will attempt to answer. His first question was: what had happened since 1963, and why had it taken so long? The reason is that in 1963 there was not nearly so much transportation of this kind of fuel oil around. Secondly, and probably more importantly, this order hinges on the regulations specifying measuring equipment, which came in in 1979: the regulations were revised in 1983 and it was only then that serious work on the complementary documentation requirements could proceed.

The noble Lord asked what evidence was needed that this order was necessary. National statistics are not collected centrally, but prosecutions average about 12 per year, and of course there are considerably more complaints which cannot be proceeded with for lack of evidence. We hope, obviously, that after bringing in this order it will be easier to bring evidence to prosecute in such cases.

The noble Lord also mentioned possible burdens on business. This order will not impose any heavy burdens on business because reputable companies already use documentation which covers the requirements of the order, which we have kept as simple as possible, consistent with the best existing practice. Others will need to bring their documentation procedures into line with it.

The noble Lord also asked me about the difference between paragraphs 3 and 4. Paragraph 4 covers fuel which is not for sale: that is, fuel which is being transported between depots. He also asked what unit of measurement would be used and whether it would be gallons or litres. Either can be used. The noble Lord then asked me who would enforce this measure. In the normal course of work, it will be trading standards officers. It will simplify their job and should not require any additional manpower.

Lastly, the noble Lord asked why the order was priced at £1.35, which appeared to him to be very expensive. I am afraid I really have no answer at all to that question; I really do not know.

On Question, Motion agreed to.