Speeches by Mayer.

“You have talked about the Government’s development of the rolling stock strategy that you are being engaged on. Do you think that it needs to be accompanied by a more detailed document specifying the upcoming needs of customers, or do you think that it will be enough in and of itself, given the engagement you have had?”

“Did you find the DFT to be a good client for you?”

“Okay.”

“How has the procurement model changed since 2020 from a financier’s perspective?”

“I think you have covered timings, and money. What detail do you actually want in this pipeline?”

“Do you work differently with a privately owned operator than you would with an operator that has been taken over by the Department for Transport Operator?”

“Will the Minister give way?”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir John, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Waveney Valley (Adrian Ramsay) on securing this debate. I last spoke about eggs in a debate just before Easter, but eggs are not just for Easter; they are for all year round. As other hon. Members have already said, we a…”

“Thank you very much, Madam Deputy Speaker. I think buses are brilliant, so I am delighted that this Bill is coming forward on 2 June, because, as you said, it is my birthday. I thought it was the Minister’s way of wishing me many happy returns—and singles also! For too long, buses have been in decline. It is great that…”

“I thank the hon. Member for giving way. Does she agree that it can be a particular problem when remote areas become new-build areas, yet are completely lacking in any mobile or broadband infrastructure? Some telecom companies say that they are not fully involved in the planning aspects, yet they can fully see the house…”

“Will the hon. Member give way?”

“Thank you for calling me so early on, Madam Deputy Speaker, at the sunrise of the debate. I believe there is not only a climate and biodiversity emergency, but real insecurity in our energy market. That is why I absolutely back the Government’s plan to triple our solar capacity and reach the clean power target by 2030.…”

“I think we need a mix, but we cannot rule out using solar panels on large chunks of land. When the Minister came along to visit our solar farm in Eggington, he not only met the sheep, but saw that some of the land around the panels has been transformed into wildflower meadows. In my constituency, AW Group —the people w…”

“Do you think one extra member of staff is enough? Is that a floor or a ceiling in terms of the Department’s ambitions?”

“We talked earlier about the fact that BSIP was about finding new services and that the Bill was particularly about protecting socially necessary services. The onus seems to be very much on local authorities to decide. Is there not a danger that, by putting that emphasis in the Bill, and in new law and legislation, you …”

“It strikes me that the formula is quite important, otherwise there could literally be a list of whichever person in the community shouted the loudest about a given bus, and there would not necessarily be an evidence base behind that.”

“Does the Department have a bus fare strategy?”

“Moving to enhanced partnerships, we have had mixed evidence. The Confederation for Passenger Transport called them “a valuable tool”. We have also had evidence that suggested they were no more than “goodwill documents”. Does the Department have plans to reform enhanced partnerships—for example, by allowing local transp…”

“On the point about councils identifying socially necessary services, are you going to require councils to produce lists, or the formula behind how they got to the list?”

“In the bus services Bill there are extra rules, as you mentioned, to make sure that there is a list of supported services agreed by all parties, but that is only applicable to enhanced partnerships. It is not applicable to franchised services. It would appear that we are moving in the direction of more and more franchi…”