Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of the extent to which the new elements of the updated Highway Code published on 29 January 2022 promote safe walking for pedestrians, particularly in relation to cyclists.
Answered by Trudy Harrison
The updates to the Highway Code made on 29 January 2022 were an extension to the existing advice and guidance.
The amendments simply reinforce the good behaviours that we would expect every road user to adhere to and drivers should already be following the rules of the road. The changes will lead to improvements in road safety as they encourage more mutual respect and consideration for all road users.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what information his Department holds on the (a) average starting salary, (b) average salary (including bonuses and overtime), (c) highest salary (including bonuses and overtime) paid to a (i) train driver and (ii) tube driver in the UK in each of the last three years.
Answered by Wendy Morton
Information relating to salary is managed and set by the individual Train Operating Companies in line with their annual budgets. The Office for National Statistics publishes detailed statistics on pay by occupation at: https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/earningsandworkinghours/datasets/occupation4digitsoc2010ashetable14
Data from the above statistics states that for ‘train and tram drivers’, median annual gross pay was:
2021 = £59,189
2020 = £55,546
2019 = £56,102
The 80th percentile figures, where the top 20% of employees are paid above this figure, are
2021 = £70,352
2020 = £67,709
2019 = £67,037
Transport in London is devolved to the Mayor of London and Transport for London (TfL).
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many road traffic (a) accidents and (b) deaths have resulted from individuals driving cars purchased while not holding a valid driving licence since 2012.
Answered by Trudy Harrison
The information requested is not available.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment the Government has made of the potential merits of requiring cyclists and motorcyclists to wear high visibility clothing.
Answered by Trudy Harrison
The safety of vulnerable road users is a priority for the Government. The Department recommends that cyclists and motorcyclists wear clothing that makes them sufficiently visible to other road users, and has recently revised the Highway Code to make this even clearer. However, the Government has no plans to mandate the wearing of high visibility clothing either for cyclists or for motorcyclists. For cyclists, the benefits would be outweighed by the fact that it would be likely to put many people off cycling, thereby reducing the health and environmental benefits that cycling can provide.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many (a) fatal and (b) non-fatal road accidents involving someone driving the vehicle under the age of 17 when that person (i) owned the vehicle and (ii) did not own the vehicle they were driving at the time of the incident have occurred in the UK in each of the last 20 years.
Answered by Trudy Harrison
The Department does not hold information on whether drivers in reported personal injury road accidents own the vehicle they are operating at the time of the road accident.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many (a) fatal and (b) non-fatal road accidents involving a vehicle that did not have a valid MOT certificate have occurred in the UK in each of last 20 years.
Answered by Trudy Harrison
The department does not hold information on whether vehicles involved in a reported road accident had a valid MOT certificate.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many (a) fatal and (b) non-fatal road accidents involving someone who owned a car but did not have a driving licence have occurred in the UK in each of the last 20 years.
Answered by Trudy Harrison
The department does not hold information on whether drivers in reported personal injury road accidents own the vehicle they are operating.
Partially complete data is held for whether the driver of a vehicle holds a driving licence which is appropriate for the vehicle from 2012 only. The number of a) fatal and b) non-fatal reported personal injury road accidents involving a car driver by whether their driver’s licence was appropriate for the vehicle for Great Britain from 2012 to 2020 can be found below.
a)
Reported fatal road accidents involving car drivers by reported driving licence type, Great Britain, 2012 to 2020 | |||||||||||
Year | Full | Provisional | Unlicensed | Unknown | |||||||
2012 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 1,239 | |||||||
2013 | 17 | 0 | 0 | 1,224 | |||||||
2014 | 22 | 0 | 1 | 1,268 | |||||||
2015 | 30 | 1 | 0 | 1,211 | |||||||
2016 | 240 | 16 | 10 | 1,106 | |||||||
2017 | 298 | 30 | 7 | 1,015 | |||||||
2018 | 312 | 16 | 3 | 1,026 | |||||||
2019 | 391 | 7 | 9 | 921 | |||||||
2020 | 399 | 15 | 13 | 678 | |||||||
Source: DfT, STATS19 |
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b)
Reported non-fatal personal injury road accidents involving car drivers by reported driving licence type, Great Britain, 2012 to 2020 |
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Year | Full | Provisional | Unlicensed | Unknown | ||||||||
2012 | 569 | 4 | 9 | 126,835 | ||||||||
2013 | 3,318 | 31 | 126 | 117,380 | ||||||||
2014 | 2,983 | 15 | 170 | 124,287 | ||||||||
2015 | 3,874 | 280 | 26 | 118,820 | ||||||||
2016 | 20,957 | 1,170 | 136 | 101,814 | ||||||||
2017 | 22,169 | 1,084 | 132 | 94,249 | ||||||||
2018 | 22,386 | 905 | 151 | 88,266 | ||||||||
2019 | 27,298 | 499 | 166 | 79,946 | ||||||||
2020 | 23,229 | 498 | 197 | 58,540 | ||||||||
Source: DfT, STATS19 |
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Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many miles of railway was electrification completed in each calendar year since 1997.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
The Office of Rail and Road publishes information about delivered electrification, the relevant information for Great Britain is shown below.
Financial year | New electrification projects track miles |
1997-98 | 0 |
1998-99 | 0 |
1999-00 | 0 |
2000-01 | 0 |
2001-02 | 0 |
2002-03 | 0 |
2003-04 | 14 |
2004-05 | 24 |
2005-06 | 3 |
2006-07 | 0 |
2007-08 | 0 |
2008-09 | 22 |
2009-10 | 0 |
2010-11 | 66 |
2011-12 | 0 |
2012-13 | 6 |
2013-14 | 38 |
2014-15 | 110 |
2015-16 | 4 |
2016-17 | 0 |
2017-18 | 181 |
2018-19 | 549 |
2019-20 | 156 |
2020-21 | 111 |
This information has been extracted from Table 6320 on the ORR’s data portal published here: https://dataportal.orr.gov.uk/statistics/infrastructure-and-emissions/rail-infrastructure-and-assets/table-6320-infrastructure-on-the-mainline/.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many miles of new railway was built and in which regions (a) from 1997 to 2010 and (b) from 2010 to date.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
The Office of Rail and Road publish railway infrastructure statistics, which contain the total length of track in Great Britain (including Scotland). The table below gives total track length from 1999-00. This information is not available by region and this data is not available prior to 1999.
The year-on-year change in track length is the net change of new track added minus length of track closed. Therefore, a year-on-year increase does not necessarily equal the total length of new track added.
Track Miles of the rail network in Great Britain. Source: ORR
Year | Total track miles | Year | Total track miles |
1999-00 | 19,167 | 2010-11 | 19,330 |
2000-01 | 19,167 | 2011-12 | 19,302 |
2001-02 | 19,866 | 2012-13 | 19,309 |
2002-03 | 19,738 | 2013-14 | 19,320 |
2003-04 | 19,613 | 2014-15 | 19,337 |
2004-051 | 19,562 | 2015-16 | 19,383 |
2005-06 | 19,328 | 2016-173 | 19,400 |
2006-072 | 19,302 | 2017-18 | 19,286 |
2007-08 | 19,313 | 2018-19 | 19,319 |
2008-09 | 19,336 | 2019-20 | 19,398 |
2009-10 | 19,308 | 2020-21 | 19,418 |
1 Prior to 2004-05 route length data and electrification data was collected using various systems and collected on a semi-annual basis. These systems, whilst often the most accurate measures available at the time, would not have provided as accurate a measure as the GEOGIS system and there is therefore a break in the time series between 2003-04 and 2004-05.
2 There is a break in the time series between 2006-07 and 2007-08 due to a new methodology where the route classification reference data was revamped.
3 There is a break in the time series between 2016-17 and 2017-18 due to Network Rail replacing GEOGIS, its master database for track assets, with a new system called INM (Integrated Network Model).This means any comparison of the current route length with previous years must be treated with caution.
Asked by: Richard Holden (Conservative - North West Durham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what plans the Government has to relax section 19 or section 22 licences for charities or community-interest-companies, such as Weardale Community Transport, to enable those organisations to run services for social benefit that enable them to cross subsidise free community services.
Answered by Trudy Harrison
The Government understands that community transport operators provide vital services that both encourage growth and reduce isolation by linking people with their communities, helping take them to shops, work, school, and medical appointments.
There are a number of requirements which need to be fulfilled in order to operate under a section 19 or section 22 Community Transport permit. One of the potential exemptions from legislation for ‘not-for-profit’ organisations is that the operator provides transport services for exclusively non-commercial purposes.
A judgment from a Judicial Review made clear that where an operator provides road passenger transport services simply for the purpose of generating surpluses to fund other transport or non-transport activities, the operator does not fall within the exclusively non-commercial purposes exemption.
However, cross-subsidies are not completely precluded. For example, if an operator providing rural bus services is doing so for the sole purpose of social welfare, then the fact that some routes are profitable whilst others are not, does not prevent it from falling within the non-commercial purposes exemption, despite an element of cross-subsidisation between different routes.