Tuesday 15th February 2011

(13 years, 9 months ago)

Written Statements
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Theresa Villiers Portrait The Minister of State, Department for Transport (Mrs Theresa Villiers)
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Subject to parliamentary approval, the Office of Rail Regulation departmental expenditure limit (DEL) and annually managed expenditure (AME) will be increased as follows:

DEL: £792,000

AME: £243,000

The impact on resources and capital are as set out in the following table:

£'000

Change

NEW DEL

Voted

Non-voted

Voted

Non-voted

Total

Resource

242

550

2

550

552

Of which

Administration budget

242

-

2

-

2

Capital

(450)

-

350

-

350

Depreciation

150

-

(750)

-

(750)

Total

(58)

550

(398)

550

152



The change in the resource element of DEL arises because ORR is unable to record more income than cost from the industry. £242,000 budget cover is required so that ORR can reduce the recorded negative DEL to a token vote of £2,000.

The spring supplementary also reflects ORR’s cash payment £550,000 towards releasing provisions for early departures in 2010-11. ORR does not require cash to make these payments but needs to reflect the cost in non-voted DEL so that ORR does not exceed its overall DEL limit for 2010-11.

ORR needs to increase its provision due to staff changes that will take place. The spring supplementary shows a further £243,000 (non-cash) being added to a provision initially created in the main estimate. These AME costs will be recovered from the rail industry.

These changes are of a technical nature to ensure that ORR keeps within its DEL and AME limits. ORR is funded by the railway industry and anticipates an underspend against its gross budget of circa £2,000,000 this year.