Asked by: David Smith (Labour - North Northumberland)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of the public ownership of railways for the North East.
Answered by Mike Kane - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Public ownership will end the failed franchising system, allowing operators to serve the interests of passengers and taxpayers in the North-East and across the country, rather than private operators and their shareholders. Public ownership will mean all parts of the railway can pull together for the benefit of passengers and bringing passenger services into public ownership is the first step in the Government’s wider programme of reform. Public ownership will also save the taxpayer up to an estimated £150 million a year in fees that are currently paid out to private-sector operators.
Asked by: Clive Jones (Liberal Democrat - Wokingham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps she is taking to tackle (a) fraudulent V62 applications and (b) car cloning.
Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) has robust measures in place to help prevent fraudulent V62 applications being processed. When a V62 application is received for a vehicle for which there is already a registered keeper on record, the DVLA will write to the current keeper to check if they still have the vehicle. If the registered keeper confirms that they are still in possession of the vehicle, the V62 application will not be processed, no new vehicle registration certificate will be issued and further investigations will be made.
The law requires that anyone who supplies number plates for road use in the UK must be registered with the DVLA. It is a legal requirement for suppliers to carry out checks to ensure that number plates are only sold to those who can prove they are entitled to the registration number. Number plate suppliers must also keep records of the plates they have supplied.
The DVLA is currently working with the National Police Chiefs’ Council and other government departments on ways to improve the identification and enforcement of number plate crime.
Asked by: Rupert Lowe (Reform UK - Great Yarmouth)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if she will provide a breakdown by place of birth of all new driving licence applications in each of the last 10 years.
Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The information requested can only be provided at disproportionate cost as a scan of the DVLA’s driving licence database and subsequent manual scrutiny and organisation of the data would be necessary to obtain the information requested.
Asked by: Andrew Rosindell (Conservative - Romford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what funding her Department is allocating to Havering Council to tackle potholes in the next financial year.
Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
This Government is committed to tackling the poor state of our roads and has pledged to help local authorities to fix our pothole-ridden road networks. As part of this, it will help enable local highway authorities in England to fix up to a million more potholes a year.
At Budget 2024, the Chancellor announced an extra £500 million for local highway maintenance for the 2025/26 financial year, an increase of nearly 50% compared to the current financial year. The Government will confirm 2025/26 funding allocations to local highway authorities in due course.
Asked by: Marie Tidball (Labour - Penistone and Stocksbridge)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps she is taking to help improve local bus services.
Answered by Mike Kane - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Over the fourteen years the previous Government was in office thousands of vital bus services disappeared across the country, and local bus services were left in a shocking state.
Improving local bus services is a key part of this government’s growth mission. We will introduce a transformative Buses Bill to put the power over bus services back in the hands of local leaders, and in the Budget confirmed over £1 billion to support and improve services across England.
Asked by: Laurence Turner (Labour - Birmingham Northfield)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many live bus service registrations there were in (a) Birmingham and (b) the West Midlands in (i) 2009-10 and (ii) 2023-24.
Answered by Mike Kane - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Office for the Traffic Commissioner (OTC) only publish data on a traffic area wide basis. In the West Midlands, the term traffic area wide would include the West Midlands conurbation, Warwickshire, Staffordshire, Worcestershire, Herefordshire and Shropshire.
In 2009/10 the OTC reported that there were 2,262 local bus services registered in the West Midlands. In 2023/24 there were 633 registered with a traffic commissioner. However, it should be noted that this figure does not include services that operate wholly within the West Midlands Combined Authority as they hold delegated authority under their Enhanced Partnership to register local services.
Asked by: Helen Morgan (Liberal Democrat - North Shropshire)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether her Department took into account the scale of the reduction in bus miles in each authority area over the past five years when allocating Bus Service Improvement Plan funding for 2025-26.
Answered by Mike Kane - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The government has confirmed £955 million for the 2025 to 2026 financial year to support and improve bus services in England outside London. This includes £243 million for bus operators and £712 million allocated to local authorities across the country. Shropshire Council has been allocated £4.4 million of this funding.
As the Secretary of State noted in her oral statement to the House of Commons on 18 November, funding for local authorities has been allocated based on local needs, including population, the distance that buses travel, and levels of deprivation.
Asked by: Helen Morgan (Liberal Democrat - North Shropshire)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether her Department made an assessment of Shropshire Council’s Bus Service Improvement Plan before deciding the authority’s 2025-26 funding.
Answered by Mike Kane - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The government has confirmed £955 million for the 2025 to 2026 financial year to support and improve bus services in England outside London. This includes £243 million for bus operators and £712 million allocated to local authorities across the country. Shropshire Council has been allocated £4.4 million of this funding.
As the Secretary of State noted in her oral statement to the House of Commons on 18 November, funding for local authorities has been allocated based on local needs, including population, the distance that buses travel, and levels of deprivation.
Asked by: Helen Morgan (Liberal Democrat - North Shropshire)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if her Department will publish the criteria used to decide the bus service improvement plan funding allocations for 2025-26.
Answered by Mike Kane - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The government has confirmed £955 million for the 2025 to 2026 financial year to support and improve bus services in England outside London. This includes £243 million for bus operators and £712 million allocated to local authorities across the country. Shropshire Council has been allocated £4.4 million of this funding.
As the Secretary of State noted in her oral statement to the House of Commons on 18 November, funding for local authorities has been allocated based on local needs, including population, the distance that buses travel, and levels of deprivation.
Asked by: Danny Chambers (Liberal Democrat - Winchester)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether she plans to change the level of train fares on South Western Railways when it is taken into public ownership.
Answered by Mike Kane - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Whilst it is our ambition through public ownership to deliver a more affordable railway, any long-term changes or concessions made to rail fares policy require balancing against the potential impacts on passengers, taxpayers and the railway.
Through future legislation, we will set out the role Great British Railways will have in fares, ticketing, and other operational aspects of the railway.