Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many new open access rail operations have been approved since May 2010; and how many such operations were approved between May 2005 and April 2010 under the previous administration.

Approval of track access agreements is a statutory function of the independent Office of Rail Regulation (ORR).　The Department for Transport does not intervene in their decision making.

The Department does not hold this information but the ORR lists all current licence holders on its website.