Speeches by Mayer.

“First, I have to say to the Leader of the House that I have a complaint about this Labour Government: it has entirely messed up the pattern of my life! At the beginning of every year, I used to know what I was going to be doing: I would be standing outside a train station, complaining about Tory fare rises—but no more!…”

“When you have a speedometer in front of you, the middle—the bit you look at as a driver—is around 60 mph, and there are a whole load of speeds that you are obviously not allowed to do on that side. Should that middle point be moved?”

“Does the Department for Transport collect the right data to best understand driver compliance with speed limits?”

“Would it be down to the private sector to do that?”

“Do you think the strategy in any way overstates the potential impact of new technologies?”

“We have covered this to some extent, so you can keep some answers short. Is there a contradiction in the Government’s approach to reducing the number of those killed and seriously injured on our roads, given that speed management is a key lever for achieving this objective but is left to local discretion?”

“What should it do?”

“There is the ballot box, I suppose.”

“Wales as a country is a reasonably large geographical area. The equivalent in terms of square miles in my part of the world would be the whole of the east of England. Yet these decisions are taken by individual local highway authorities. Is there a sense of how big a geography such a decision needs to be taken over for…”

“What role should intelligent speed assistance play in helping drivers to comply with speed limits?”

“T2. The Houghton health hub, which I recently visited, is very well located in the town centre next to a library. It is owned by the council and leased by NHS Property Services, which in turn is paid by the integrated care board for the modern clinical rooms, which are on the right as people go in. So far, so good. The…”

“Is this strategy a one-off, or are you working on version 2? Is it going to last the test of time? What is the plan?”

“Let us say that AI has said, “Look, the train is late. If only this bus would wait for five minutes, everything would be much better for the passengers.” It still involves someone having the ability and confidence to make that decision, and knowing that they are not going to get into trouble for making the decision, wh…”

“This is really about integration and passengers. We had some evidence earlier on in the sessions. Fundamentally, if you are a passenger at a station, they sometimes hold the train because the one behind has been delayed for some reason or other. When we asked the bus company, “Is there ever an occasion where you might …”

“In my example, holding the bus for five minutes is genuinely a good thing; it is actively good, according to the whole suite of data. Further down the line, those benefits are good too, according to AI.”

“In our most recent evidence session, some witnesses suggested that there were several areas in which the strategy could be improved. One of those were clearer targets. You have talked already today about metrics and commitments, but not specifically about targets. Is there a reason why Better Connected does not have ta…”

“What would you do if you thought a local area was not delivering what the Government thought was a desired outcome?”

“When you have individual policies, will you be looking specifically to see whether they create a more integrated transport network?”

“If you have given areas powers, tools and funding, does it not all just rely a bit too much on good will?”

“Delivering good integration will rely on collaboration between Government, local authorities, transport operators, providers of infrastructure and services, and probably many more people. What role do you plan for your Department to have in supporting this collaboration and ensuring that it supports the ambitions set o…”