Delivery Services: Robotics
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what powers local authorities have to restrict or prohibit the use of pavement delivery robots within their areas.
Answered by Simon Lightwood
Where pavement robots currently operate, they do so in partnership with the relevant local authority.
The Government announced last week that it will facilitate new trials of pavement delivery robots in new places through powers in the Regulating for Growth Bill. This will be done with a view to creating a clear, lawful route to market for pavement delivery robots which will expand services to new contexts, new areas and with new businesses.
As with other trials of new technologies on our roads, such as the e-scooter trials, local leaders will decide whether they want to trial pavement delivery robots and shape how any trial operates.
In the longer term, licensing powers for shared micromobility schemes in the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act could be extended to pavement robots so that local leaders will always decide whether and how these vehicles can operate in their area.
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