Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent estimate he has made of the number of cyclists who have died due to potholes on roads in (a) Coventry, (b) the West Midlands and (c) England in each of the last five years.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
The Department does not collect data on the cause of road accidents, or on potholes in road accidents specifically.
Contributory factors assigned by police officers do not assign blame for the accident to any specific road user, however they do provide some insight into why and how road accidents occur. They give an indication of which factors the attending officer thought contributed to the accident. Officers do not need to carry out a full investigation of the incident before allocating contributory factors; they usually use professional judgement about what they can see at the scene.
The number of reported pedal cyclist fatalities in England where a contributory factor of ‘poor or defective road surface’ was reported in the personal injury road accident, for the last five years, is provided in the table.
Reported pedal cyclist fatalities in road accidents where 'Poor or defective road surface' was reported as a contributory factor, selected areas, 2015 to 2019
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Year | England | West Midlands | Coventry |
2015 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
2016 | 4 | 1 | 0 |
2017 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
2018 | 3 | 0 | 0 |
2019 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Source: DfT STATS19 | |||
Road safety statistics are reported on a calendar year basis. The latest annual published statistics are for 2019. Data on reported personal injury road accidents in Great Britain for 2020 will be published in September 2021.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department is taking to increase the affordability of electric cars.
Answered by Rachel Maclean
The Government is investing £2.5bn?, with grants available to reduce the upfront cost of plug in vehicles, as well?as funding?to support chargepoint infrastructure. The March Budget included £532m extra funding to keep plug in vehicle grants until 2022/3, and an additional £500m to support the roll out of charging infrastructure over the next five years. Additionally, all fully electric cars are exempt from Vehicle Excise Duty, and will pay no Company Car Tax in 2020/21, just 1% in 2021/22 and 2% in 2022/23 through 2024/25. The Government is continuing to provide grants to encourage people to charge at home overnight with a grant of up to £350?towards the installation of domestic chargers. Research by Go Ultra Low indicates that charging at home can cost from as little as 1p per mile driven, compared to 8-12p per mile in a petrol or diesel car. As part of our consultation on bringing forward the end to the sale of new petrol and diesel cars and vans, we are considering what further measures are required to support the uptake of zero emission vehicles.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what proportion of railway stations have step-free access.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
Around a fifth of our stations have step free access to all platforms; accounting for around 75% of journeys. We are determined to improve this and our Access for All programme is providing accessible routes at over 100 more stations in the next three years. This is in addition to accessibility improvements provided by the industry whenever they install, replace or renew station infrastructure. Information on the facilities available at railway stations is collected and held by the Rail Delivery Group and published on their website.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department is taking to increase the proportion of journeys made by (a) walking and (b) cycling.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
On 28 July the Prime Minister launched ambitious plans to boost cycling and walking, with the aim that half of all journeys in towns and cities are cycled or walked by 2030. This includes a £2 billion package of funding for active travel over the next 5 years, which is the largest ever boost for cycling and walking, and will deliver transformational change. The plan contains 33 commitments including a major roll-out of new cycling and walking infrastructure; a new body (“Active Travel England”) to audit and enforce design standards and manage investment; and the creation of a national e-bike support programme.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department is taking to reduce levels of anti-social behaviour on public transport.
Answered by Rachel Maclean
The Government is committed to reducing crime, anti-social behaviour and the fear of crime wherever it occurs in the transport system. The transport industry, local authorities, the police and others are already investing in and undertaking wide-ranging initiatives to improve the personal security of public transport passengers and staff and to keep our public transport systems as low crime environments.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that all modes of public transport are fully accessible for wheelchair users.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
Through the Inclusive Transport Strategy, launched July 2018 we aim to give disabled people equal access to the transport network by 2030, with assistance where physical infrastructure remains a barrier. This includes improving wheelchair access across all modes of transport. We understand that the needs of disabled people change over time and we will be reviewing our use of the reference wheelchair standard. We will make recommendations in future on its continued use or the use of an alternative specification.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent assessment his Department has made of the effect of cycling on (a) physical health, (b) mental health and (c) the environment.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
Cycling and walking deliver a range of health, economic and environmental benefits. These are detailed in the Prime Minister’s Plan for cycling and walking (www.gov.uk/government/publications/cycling-and-walking-plan-for-england) published on 28 July which sets an ambition for half of all journeys in towns and cities to be cycled or walked by 2030. The plan includes a £2 billion package of funding for active travel over the next 5 years, which is the largest ever boost for cycling and walking, and which will deliver transformational change.
A more detailed consideration of the effects of cycling and walking informed the development of the Department’s Cycling and Walking Investment Strategy Model, the technical reports and annexes of which were published on gov.uk on 7 February (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/cycling-and-walking-investment-strategy-active-travel-investment-models)
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department is taking to improve road safety for cyclists.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
On 28 July the Prime Minister launched ambitious plans to boost cycling and walking, with the aim that half of all journeys in towns and cities are cycled or walked by 2030. This includes a £2 billion package of funding for active travel over the next 5 years, which is the largest ever boost for cycling and walking, and will deliver transformational change. The plan includes a number of commitments which will deliver increased safety for cyclists, including the roll-out of segregated cycle lanes in towns and cities, a big increase in cycle training, higher safety standards for lorries and improved Cycle Infrastructure Design Guidance.
The Department continues to deliver the commitments contained in the Government’s response to the 2018 Cycling and Walking Investment Strategy Safety Review including a consultation on the review of the guidance in the Highway Code to improve safety for cyclists and pedestrians which closes on the 27th October.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department is taking to increase the number of electric vehicle charging points in towns and cities in England.
Answered by Rachel Maclean
The Government is providing £500 million over the next five years to support the rollout of infrastructure for electric vehicles through a range of grant schemes which are available for both urban and rural areas. Part of this is our On-street Residential Chargepoint Scheme (ORCS), which assists local authorities with the cost of installing chargepoints on residential streets. Government funding has been doubled to £20 million for the ORCS in 2020/21. This could help fund up to 7,200 chargepoints and make charging at home and overnight easier for those without an off-street parking space. The Government has also provided £40m of funding, via our Go Ultra Low city scheme, to 8 cities across the UK to support the uptake of ultra-low emission vehicles in those cities. To date, over 300 chargepoints have been installed as part of this scheme. Additional charging hubs will be installed across the country later this year such as a new hub in York. We have also consulted on proposals for chargepoint infrastructure to be installed in all newly built homes and non-residential buildings in England, where appropriate.
Asked by: Colleen Fletcher (Labour - Coventry North East)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of the rules on refunding rail season tickets as a result of the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
Following the introduction of COVID-19 travel restrictions in March, the Department introduced a number of temporary process changes to make it easier for passengers to claim refunds, including allowing season ticket holders to backdate their refund claim by up to 56 days, or the date their ticket was last used, whichever was later. In addition, new arrangements were put in place to enable season ticket holders to claim refunds remotely, and a season ticket refund calculator was added to National Rail and all train operator websites. The Department agreed with train operators that they would revert to the standard refund terms and conditions from 7 September 2020, but passengers can continue to claim refunds on unused portions of season tickets.
Train operators allocated additional resources to process the unprecedented number of refund requests as quickly as possible. Since 17 March over 220,000 season ticket holders have claimed season ticket refunds totalling over £340 million in response to COVID-19 travel restrictions.