Asked by: Tom Tugendhat (Conservative - Tonbridge)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what investment her Department has planned to enable 12 carriage trains on the Maidstone East line.
Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Southeastern (SET) have plans to improve services, increase capacity and reduce crowding to/from Maidstone East from May 2026. These include the reintroduction of Mainline services to London Blackfriars at peak times from Maidstone East; additional services between Charing Cross and Maidstone East on weekdays; and more off-peak services between London Victoria and Ashford International via Maidstone East.
SET are also exploring further options for the December 2026 timetable.
SET are always exploring the possibility of providing extra capacity where needed. This is not always feasible due to a variety of reasons, including platform lengths, rolling stock availability and funding considerations.
Asked by: Tom Tugendhat (Conservative - Tonbridge)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what plans she has to help reduce overcrowding on peak time services on the Maidstone East line.
Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Southeastern (SET) have plans to improve services, increase capacity and reduce crowding to/from Maidstone East from May 2026. These include the reintroduction of Mainline services to London Blackfriars at peak times from Maidstone East; additional services between Charing Cross and Maidstone East on weekdays; and more off-peak services between London Victoria and Ashford International via Maidstone East.
SET are also exploring further options for the December 2026 timetable.
SET are always exploring the possibility of providing extra capacity where needed. This is not always feasible due to a variety of reasons, including platform lengths, rolling stock availability and funding considerations.
Asked by: Tom Tugendhat (Conservative - Tonbridge)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what plans she has to increase capacity on the Maidstone East line.
Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Southeastern (SET) have plans to improve services, increase capacity and reduce crowding to/from Maidstone East from May 2026. These include the reintroduction of Mainline services to London Blackfriars at peak times from Maidstone East; additional services between Charing Cross and Maidstone East on weekdays; and more off-peak services between London Victoria and Ashford International via Maidstone East.
SET are also exploring further options for the December 2026 timetable.
SET are always exploring the possibility of providing extra capacity where needed. This is not always feasible due to a variety of reasons, including platform lengths, rolling stock availability and funding considerations.
Asked by: Tom Tugendhat (Conservative - Tonbridge)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate he has made of the number of parents on default rate calculations in each of the last three years.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department estimates that there were approximately 2,900 paying parents with a Default Maintenance Decision (DMD) as of June 2025. These were identified by searching for cases that had liability amounts and numbers of children corresponding to the current DMD rates. Counts from previous years are not readily available.
Asked by: Tom Tugendhat (Conservative - Tonbridge)
Question to the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero:
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, when the Government will launch the Fuel Finder scheme.
Answered by Martin McCluskey - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Energy Security and Net Zero)
The Government’s Fuel Finder scheme is now live, with registration open to motor fuel traders. From 2 February, all UK petrol filling stations will be required to report fuel prices, encouraging competitive pricing among retailers.
Fuel Finder data will be made available to data services such as mapping software and price comparison apps to enable consumers to compare prices more easily and helping to tackle the price of an essential product for thousands of hardworking people across the country.
Asked by: Tom Tugendhat (Conservative - Tonbridge)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department has made an assessment of the reasons people with brain cancer are seeking treatment outside the UK, particularly in Germany, including the trend in the level of such treatments.
Answered by Ashley Dalton
Ensuring patients have access to the latest and most effective treatment options is a top priority for the Government.
That is why we are committed to supporting an innovative clinical research ecosystem in the United Kingdom so that patients in this country can be among the first to benefit as we make the National Health Service fit for the future.
The Government is supportive of Scott Arthur’s Private Members Bill on rare cancers, which will make it easier for clinical trials into rare cancers, such as brain cancers, to take place in England by ensuring the patient population can be easily contacted by researchers. This will ensure that the NHS will remain at the forefront of medical innovation and is able to provide patients with the newest, most effective treatment options, and ultimately boost survival rates.
Asked by: Tom Tugendhat (Conservative - Tonbridge)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many and what proportion of Child Maintenance Service cases have been transferred from direct pay to collect and pay due to non-compliance in each of the last three years.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department publishes quarterly Child Maintenance Service official statistics. In the latest National tables, Table 3 provides data on the number of arrangements moving from one service type to another within the Child Maintenance Service from October 2015 to September 2015. The table includes the number of Direct Pay arrangements at the start of each quarter and the number of arrangements moving from Direct Pay to Collect and Pay during the quarter.
Asked by: Tom Tugendhat (Conservative - Tonbridge)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what estimate he has made of the number of paying parents using (a) cash-based and (b) undeclared income sources to avoid maintenance payments; and what steps the Child Maintenance Service is taking to identify hidden earnings.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Child Maintenance Service (CMS) focuses on maximising compliance and identifying hidden earnings through measures such as datasharing with HMRC.
Information about the paying parent's gross income is taken directly from HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) for the latest tax year available. This allows calculations to be made quickly and accurately. Use of historic income ensures a stable calculation, which we know from customer feedback is valued as it enables parents to rely on maintenance for financial planning purposes.
In the event a receiving parent believes a paying parent’s earnings are not captured in the standard calculation using HMRC gross income data, they can apply for a variation, under which certain other categories of income can be considered.
Cases where CMS have reason to believe paying parents maybe hiding their income can be investigated by the Financial Investigation Unit. This is a specialist team which can request information from financial institutions (such as banks, investment companies and mortgage companies) to check the accuracy of information that the CMS is given. If any discrepancies are found, they can implement a correct maintenance liability that is supported by CMS legislation.
Asked by: Tom Tugendhat (Conservative - Tonbridge)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many cases have been closed by the Child Maintenance Service in each of the last five years; and what were the primary reasons for closure.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Child Maintenance Service (CMS) operates under statutory guidelines to ensure maintenance arrangements are managed effectively and remains committed to supporting parents and ensuring that child maintenance arrangements are fair, sustainable, and responsive to changing circumstances.
The Department regularly publishes Child Maintenance Service official statistics, with the latest statistics available to September 2025. Table 3 of the accompanying National tables provides the number of arrangements moving from one service type to another within the Child Maintenance Service each quarter. In addition, the table shows the number of arrangements which were closed between October 2015 and September 2025.
The information requested on the reasons for closure is not readily available and to provide it would incur disproportionate cost.
Asked by: Tom Tugendhat (Conservative - Tonbridge)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, how many times the Child Maintenance Service IT system has experienced a (a) full outage and (b) partial service disruption in the last 12 months.
Answered by Andrew Western - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Child Maintenance Service IT system has had no full outages in the past 12 months. The service is supported by multiple digital products rather than a single system, so the data for part (b) is not held centrally and retrieving it would be disproportionately costly.