Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment she has made of the potential impact of waiting times for practical driving tests on the duration of the validity of driving theory tests.
Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
It is important road safety knowledge and hazard perception skills are up to date at the critical point a person drives unsupervised for the first time.
The maximum duration of two years between passing the theory test and a subsequent practical test is in place to ensure a candidate’s road safety knowledge and ability to identify developing hazards is current. This validity period is set in legislation and the Government has no current plans to lay further legislation to extend it.
Ensuring new drivers have current relevant knowledge and skills is a vital part of the preparation of new drivers, who are disproportionality represented in casualty statistics. Learners will therefore need to pass another theory test if their certificate expires.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment she has made of the adequacy of access to public electric vehicle charging points.
Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
As of 1 December 2024, the Government and industry have supported the installation of over 72,271 publicly available charging devices.
The Government is committed to accelerating the roll-out of charging infrastructure so that everyone, no matter where they live or work, can make the transition to an electric vehicle. Through the Local Electric Vehicle Infrastructure Fund almost £400m government funding is being provided to local authorities in England to support the delivery of over 100,000 public chargepoints. These chargepoints will transform the public charging network to ensure that everyone can access and charge their electric vehicle.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if she will encourage sustainable aviation fuel developers to additionally produce biopropane.
Answered by Mike Kane - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Biopropane is a low carbon alternative to liquid petroleum gas and is suitable for use in road vehicles and non-road mobile machinery, such as forklift trucks. Biopropane is eligible for support under the Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation (RTFO) where it meets sustainability criteria and is for a relevant end use. This could include biopropane where it is a co-product of a sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) developer’s production process.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether she has had discussions with the Northern Ireland Department for Infrastructure on school bus services fin rural areas.
Answered by Simon Lightwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
School bus services in Northern Ireland are the responsibility of the Northern Ireland Executive. My department regularly engages with colleagues in the Department for Infrastructure to discuss matters of mutual interest.
Policy responsibility for home to school transport within England is the responsibility of the Department for Education.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether she has had discussions with the Northern Ireland Department of Infrastructure on (a) pothole repairs and (b) resurfacing.
Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Secretary of State met her counterpart in the Northern Ireland Department for Infrastructure in her first days of office and the departments regularly discuss matters of mutual interest.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether she has made an assessment of trends in the number of sales of electric vehicles in the last 12 months.
Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The total number of EVs registered in the UK continues to increase, amidst a growing overall market. Just under 270,000 battery electric cars have been sold so far this year, according to industry statistics, 13% higher than the number sold this time last year. The battery electric vehicle share of the new car market in the year to date is 17.8%, and in the month of September 2024 this was 20.5% - a record high.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what recent assessment her Department has made of the efficiency of electric vehicle charging points across the UK.
Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Government has not made a recent assessment of chargepoint efficiencies across the UK.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps she is taking to help reduce the number of violent attacks on women and girls on rail services.
Answered by Simon Lightwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
This government has set out its mission to halve violence against women and girls within a decade and will treat this work as a national emergency.
No one should ever have to face the risk of violence or harassment when travelling on our transport networks.
We are taking action to make sure women and girls in particular feel safe on our transport network. We work closely with railway partners, including the British Transport Police (BTP), to achieve this. BTP utilises specialist teams of plain clothed and uniformed officers across the network to target and identify offenders. It uses enhanced patrols, with a directed, intelligence-led focus around the nighttime economy, providing high-visibility presence to reassure rail staff and the public.
Current public campaigns and support tools include the National Rail ‘Zero Tolerance’ campaign aimed at ending sexual harassment and BTP’s Railway Guardian app, which provides safety advice, links to partner organisations and enables reporting of incidents to the force directly. Previous public awareness campaigns have included using real victim stories to encourage more members of the public to come forward and report incidents of sexual harassment to the force.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what discussions she has had with representatives of the aviation industry on levels of compensation for passengers whose flights are cancelled.
Answered by Mike Kane - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Regulation 261/2004 sets out passenger rights in the event of certain flight disruptions. Under this Regulation, passengers who have their flight cancelled are entitled to a refund or alternative flight. In some circumstances, passengers may also be entitled to additional compensation.
Government is committed to working with industry and stakeholders to ensure consumers continue to have a high level of protection whilst travelling by air.
Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether her (a) Department and (b) agencies take steps to (i) monitor and (ii) prevent the use of vehicles by car rental operators registered outside of the UK to circumvent the zero emission vehicle mandate.
Answered by Lilian Greenwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Department for Transport works closely with the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency and the Devolved Governments to verify vehicle registration and location data for use in compliance. The ZEV Mandate includes a range of measures to prevent and penalise circumvention.