Bus Accident Data Collection

20. If he will bring forward legislative proposals for the mandatory collection of bus accident data by bus companies for publication by local authorities.

It is up to individual local transport authorities to determine which powers in the Bus Services Act 2017 are used to address issues of bus safety. Under a partnership or franchising scheme, bus operators could be required to provide bus safety data at specified intervals.

While in London this data is collected, in all other areas of the country it is not. It is public transport we are talking about and the public should be made aware, or be allowed to be made aware, of this key data on the number of accidents and the causes of those accidents. Will the Minister agree to meet me and members of the family of Rowan Fitzgerald, who sadly died in 2015 in an unnecessary accident, to discuss the proposals in Rowan’s law?

I know the hon. Gentleman has met a number of bus Ministers to discuss the fatal accident in Coventry in 2015. I offer my deepest condolences for this terrible tragedy. Collection of data could be considered within the national bus strategy. I, or one of my colleagues, would be happy to meet him to discuss that further.