Brooks Newmark welcomes new freight road charging bill
Brooks Newmark welcomes the new HGV Road User Levy Bill which will make foreign-registered hauliers help pay for the upkeep of UK roads and go some way to address the advantages they enjoy over UK-based hauliers.
Mr Brooks Newmark (Braintree) (Con): Like everyone else in the Chamber, I think that the HGV Road User Levy Bill is extremely welcome. Like the hon. Member for Dundee East (Stewart Hosie), I had not intended to speak, but then something rang in my brain, as I have many road hauliers in my constituency and I thought I would speak up for them. With regard to his comment about the brevity of the Minister’s introductory comments, it is clear that the Bill is so compelling that he needed only a minute to introduce it.
There are two key arguments I have heard from many independent operators as well as larger hauliers, such as the Prince group, in my constituency: the equity argument, which was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Spelthorne (Kwasi Kwarteng); and the economic argument, which was raised by my hon. Friends the Members for Milton Keynes South (Iain Stewart), for High Peak (Andrew Bingham) and for North West Leicestershire (Andrew Bridgen). The equity argument is an important one that all road hauliers make, which is that it is simply unfair that road hauliers can come here from overseas and use our country’s roads but contribute nothing whatsoever to maintaining them. The Bill goes at least some way towards redressing that imbalance.
In these tough economic times there is also the economic argument. It is unfair that our road hauliers face such marginal costs, especially given the high price of fuel, so trying to equalise what foreign users pay for using our roads will create a little more equilibrium and will not give them the extra marginal cost advantage they have in these tough economic times. Given the equity argument and the economic argument, I wholly endorse the Bill.
Now that the Minister is in his place, I would like to thank him for the financial support he recently gave for the A120, which will help unclog the roads even if they are used by road hauliers.
LATER IN THE SAME DEBATE
Mr Newmark: Hon. Members have articulated the views of the road haulage industry in their respective constituencies. Will the Minister spend a couple of minutes going into a little more detail on the consultation he had with the industry and on its input, and explain why the Bill is the silver bullet that will make the road haulage industry in the UK happy?
Stephen Hammond: I would like to tell my hon. Friend the dates, places and times of the meetings, but unfortunately the excellent preparatory work on the Bill was done prior to my time in this role—it was done by the current Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office and officials when he was an Under-Secretary of State for Transport. As I have said, an extensive consultation took place and has been published. The measure received widespread support, albeit with a number of questions on how the scheme might work and be implemented, which has been reflected in the debate—a number of the questions were similar to those raised by road hauliers.