Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of options for increasing service frequencies on the Nottingham-Lincoln line; and what the revenue subsidy and capital cost of implications are of each such option.

As stated in the Greater Lincolnshire Deal, which was part of the Local Growth Fund announcement on 7 July, the Department is committed to working with D2N2 and the Greater Lincolnshire Local Enterprise Partnership and partners to help achieve their objective of increased service frequency between Lincoln and Nottingham via Newark.

However, this is dependent on the affordability and value for money of the services. In addition, it is dependent on the level of local funding available to support these incremental rail services for the first three years, after which the Department would consider continuing with the services as part of its base specification. We are currently assessing the available options against the criteria above, taking account of likely revenue and cost implications alongside the latest funding offer from the stakeholders.