Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department is taking to address railway signal failures caused by periods of very hot weather.

The resilience of the signalling system and other railway infrastructure to extreme weather conditions is the responsibility of Network Rail. With Ministers’ support, the company has developed a Weather Resilience and Climate Change Adaptation Plan for each of its eight Routes in order to understand the risks and to provide a focus for action to mitigate these. Specific measures include the roll-out of uninterruptible power supplies to help reduce signal failures, and the greater use of remote condition monitoring technology to ensure that any emerging issues are identified as soon as practicable.