Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, which external consultants were involved in the negotiations with Virgin for the rail passenger franchise directly awarded to West Coast Trains Ltd; and what the cost to his Department was of each such consultancy.

The Department for Transport ran a procurement for legal, technical and financial advisers for the InterCity West Coast Direct Award project. The advisers contracted, and the estimated fees to be paid for the work on the project, are shown below:

Legal advisers – Addleshaw Goddard - £204,960

Technical advisers – TRL-Halcrow - £227,607

Financial advisers – PwC - £264,467