Asked by: Suzanne Webb (Conservative - Stourbridge)
Question to the Department for Transport:
What steps his Department is taking to improve the condition of England’s roads.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department is providing over £2.7 billion for the maintenance of England’s local highway network, outside of London, over 2020/21 and 2021/22, and £4.1 billion for capital renewals on the strategic road network in England over the next 5 years.
Asked by: Suzanne Webb (Conservative - Stourbridge)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what plans are in place to ensure customer confidence in the (a) accessibility, (b) adequacy of access for blind and partially sighted people and (c) cleanliness of the public transport system once covid-19 lockdown measures have been relaxed.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
On 12 May 2020, in response to Covid-19, the Department for Transport published safer travel guidance for passengers and operators. These documents are clear that all equality and discrimination laws and obligations continue to apply and that operators should ensure everyone who needs to can continue to access the transport network.
Operators should consider their messaging, and continue to support those with protected characteristics, as they normally would. The documents also remind passengers of the potentially different experience of those with disabilities, including hidden disabilities. The Department is working closely with the Disabled Persons Transport Advisory Committee to identify how to improve the experience of disabled passengers during lockdown and into the future.
The guidance advises the public to avoid public transport where possible and, if they need to use it, how to stay safe – for example by wearing a face covering if possible and washing their hands before, during and after travel. We have advised operators that they could consider additional cleaning measures and protocols to limit coronavirus transmission. These steps should help boost confidence for all passengers.
Asked by: Suzanne Webb (Conservative - Stourbridge)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the systems in place to refund rail season tickets.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
The Department and Transport Focus are in regular contact with the rail industry to monitor the effectiveness of the systems in place to refund rail season tickets. This has led to the introduction of new processes to make claiming refunds easier during this crisis.
Passengers are now able to claim refunds remotely and we have allowed passengers to backdate their season ticket refund claim to 17th March, when ‘do not travel’ advice was first introduced. The refund acceptance period for passengers has also been extended to 56 days, and a season ticket refund calculator has been added to National Rail’s website.
Train operators have allocated additional resources to process the unprecedented number of refund requests as quickly as possible. Since 17th March over 85,000 season ticket holders have claimed season ticket refunds totalling over £130 million in response to COVID-19 travel restrictions.
Asked by: Suzanne Webb (Conservative - Stourbridge)
Question to the Department for Transport:
What steps his Department is taking to improve rail services in the West Midlands.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris - Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
Major investment is planned to improve rail services throughout the region. In the West Midlands, £700m is being invested in a fleet of 180 new carriages which will deliver 20,000 more peak hour seats into Birmingham over the next two years,
The East Midlands will benefit from our £1.5bn upgrade of the Midland Mainline, with faster peak time journeys to London from this December and a brand-new fleet of bi-mode trains entering service from 2022.