Asked by: Bob Stewart (Conservative - Beckenham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of installing ticket barriers at Hayes railway station in the context of trends in fare evasion on the Mid-Kent line.
Answered by Huw Merriman
Southeastern is assessing the viability of installing ticket barriers at several of its stations including Hayes. Network Rail's Industry Revenue Generating Investment Fund allows the train operating companies to apply for funding for schemes that are financially positive and reduce the cost of rail to the public purse. Installing ticket barriers at Hayes is one of several potential schemes Southeastern is considering for an application to the fund later in the year. Applications will be assessed as part of a competitive process, therefore submitting a bid for a scheme is no guarantee of funding.
Asked by: Bob Stewart (Conservative - Beckenham)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking with Bromley Council to provide additional school places in the north-west of the borough.
Answered by Damian Hinds
The statutory duty to provide sufficient school places sits with local authorities. The department provides capital funding through the Basic Need grant to support local authorities to provide school places, based on their own pupil forecasts and school capacity data. Local authorities can use this funding to provide places in new schools or through expansions of existing schools and can work with any school in their local area, including academies and free schools. Bromley has received just over £80 million to support the provision of new school places needed between 2011 and 2022. Bromley has not been allocated funding in subsequent allocations because its data indicates need for mainstream places up to September 2026 had already been funded in previous years.
Asked by: Bob Stewart (Conservative - Beckenham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what information his Department holds on the funding provided to each London borough by Transport for London for the maintenance of the principal road network in (a) the 2023-24 financial year and (b) the last five financial years.
Answered by Richard Holden - Opposition Whip (Commons)
Since the start of the pandemic, the Government has supported TfL with over £6bn in grant funding. However, transport in London is devolved to the Mayor of London, so decisions on money spent on road maintenance in London is for the Mayor and TfL to make. Therefore, the Department does not hold information on the money provided to each London borough via TfL.
Asked by: Bob Stewart (Conservative - Beckenham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how much funding his Department has provided to Transport for London for the repair of potholes on (a) roads, (b) the principle road network and (c) London borough roads in the (i) 2023-24 financial year and (ii) previous five financial years.
Answered by Richard Holden - Opposition Whip (Commons)
Government has supported TfL throughout the pandemic as a result of a fall in passenger demand. This includes just under £1.2bn of funding in the latest settlement and takes government’s total funding to over £6bn since the start of the pandemic. However, as transport is devolved in London to the Mayor and TfL, it is for them to decide how much of it is used to maintain London’s roads.
Asked by: Bob Stewart (Conservative - Beckenham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if he will take steps to urge Network Rail to reopen the footbridge at Beckenham Junction station without delay.
Answered by Huw Merriman
I have been informed that the footbridge is due to be reopened in April.
Asked by: Bob Stewart (Conservative - Beckenham)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, if she will make it her policy to introduce a requirement for retailers to hold a licence to sell nitrous oxide.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
Nitrous oxide is subject to the Psychoactive Substances Act 2016 which makes it an offence to supply, offer to supply, possess with intent to supply, produce, import or export nitrous oxide knowingly or recklessly for its psychoactive effect. Possession of nitrous oxide is lawful, except in custodial settings, and a Home Office controlled drugs licence is not required by those who wish to use it for legitimate medical, research, catering or industrial purposes.
The Government are concerned about the misuse of nitrous oxide, its recognised health harms and the potential impact on communities. That is why I wrote to the Advisory Council for the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) on 7 February asking them to expedite their updated harms assessment on nitrous oxide following the Government’s initial request to the ACMD in September 2021.
The ACMD published their report on nitrous oxide on the 6 March, setting out the evidence as it currently stands and making a number of recommendations for action. The Government will consider the ACMD advice carefully along with any other available evidence, as appropriate, before deciding how to proceed.
Asked by: Bob Stewart (Conservative - Beckenham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if he will hold discussions with Southeastern on the potential merits of reinstating Cannon Street services on the mid-Kent (Hayes) line in the context of recent levels of congestion at London Bridge station.
Answered by Huw Merriman
To reduce congestion at busy junctions and give better punctuality and fewer cancellations for Southeastern customers overall, all trains on the Hayes line now go to London Charing Cross.
This means that customers looking to travel to Cannon Street need to change on to frequent connecting services at London Bridge or Lewisham. As the train operator, Southeastern are responsible for the detailed planning of their timetable and in doing so have to weigh up a range of factors such as passenger demand, operational impacts, customer feedback and financial constraints.
Department officials hold regular discussions with the Southeastern covering all aspects of their service including timetable development. Recent scenes of crowding at London Bridge, which attracted media attention, were unrelated to the timetable.
Asked by: Bob Stewart (Conservative - Beckenham)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what progress has been made on the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs' review into potential harms caused by nitrous oxide launched in September 2021.
Answered by Chris Philp - Shadow Home Secretary
The Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) is an advisory non-departmental public body. The ACMD is independent of Government and therefore the timescales for, and progress of, their reviews are a matter for them.
Home Office officials work closely with the ACMD and the Government will consider their recommendations on nitrous oxide once they are published.
Asked by: Bob Stewart (Conservative - Beckenham)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will take steps to increase Support for Mortgage Payments to reflect interest rate rises.
Answered by Mims Davies - Shadow Minister (Women)
Support for Mortgage Interest (SMI) is calculated using a standard interest rate that is based on the Bank of England’s monthly published average mortgage rate.
Any increase in SMI payments will occur when the Bank of England’s average monthly mortgage rate differs from the standard rate by 0.5 percentage points or more.
Asked by: Bob Stewart (Conservative - Beckenham)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what recent progress his Department has made on bringing forward legislative proposals to change the valuation process of extending a lease so that landlords can only charge a nominal amount.
Answered by Lucy Frazer
The Government has committed to making enfranchisement cheaper for leaseholders by reforming the process of valuation they must follow to calculate the cost of extending their lease or buying their freehold. We will abolish marriage value, cap ground rents in the calculation, prescribe the rates to be used and introduce an online calculator.
Leaseholders will be able to extend their lease with zero ground rent on payment of a premium. The length of a statutory lease extension will increase to 990 years, from 90 years (for flats) and 50 years (for houses).
The Government has already legislated via the Leasehold Reform (Ground Rent) Act 2022 to protect future leaseholders. The Act will mean that if any ground rent is demanded as part of a new residential long lease, it cannot be for more than one literal peppercorn per year.
We understand the difficulties some existing leaseholders face with high and escalating ground rents. This is why we asked the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) to investigate potential mis-selling of homes and unfair terms in the leasehold sector, which has resulted in commitments benefitting over 20,000 leaseholders. The CMA continue to engage with a number of firms and we urge other developers to follow suit.
We have been clear about our commitment to addressing the historic imbalance in the leasehold system. We are due to bring forward further leasehold reforms later in this Parliament.