Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to the answer of 6 March 2026 to WPQ 116586, whether her Department plans to publish details of the savings in fees otherwise payable to former private sector owners used to offset the increase in staff costs for DfT Operator Limited.

Once all services currently delivered under contract with the Department have transferred, public ownership is expected to save taxpayers up to an estimated £110-150 million every year on fees currently paid to privately-owned train operating companies.

This is several orders of magnitude less than the costs of scaling up DfTO staffing in anticipation of establishing GBR – as part of which we will be tackling waste and inefficiency across the fragmented railway we inherited.