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22 May 2006 : Column 1274W—continued
Concessionary Fares
Ms Diana R. Johnson: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport (1) what estimate he has made of the funding required to fund free off-peak travel for (a) older and (b) disabled persons on buses in Kingston upon Hull, North; [69761]
(2) how much funding the Government are providing to Kingston upon Hull council to provide free bus travel for (a) older and (b) disabled persons. [69762]
Gillian Merron: The Government are providing an extra £350 million for 2006-07 through the formula grant system. This will be sufficient in aggregate to fund the additional cost to local authorities. This funding is unhypothecated; therefore the funding for concessionary fares is not separately identified.
Concorde
Miss Widdecombe: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what discussions his Department has had with British Airways on the cost of reinstating Concorde. [72440]
Gillian Merron: None. Issues concerning Concorde remain a matter for British Airways and Airbus.
Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency
Mr. Pickles: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will list the (a) public and (b) private sector organisations to which the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency has (i) sold and (ii) provided drivers' names and addresses in the last two years; and what the reason for the data sharing or data transfer was in each case. [70597]
Dr. Ladyman: Access to the driver database is governed by the Data Protection Act 1998 and in general, details of a record can be released only to the data subject themselves or to a third party with the data subject's consent.
DVLA has an obligation to release information from the vehicle record to those who demonstrate a legitimate right to receive it. Various other Government and law enforcement bodies have powers under different legislation to request information from DVLA for prescribed purposes. DVLA does not record the frequency of requests from each enquirer. Table 1, which has been placed in the House Libraries, lists those who are likely to have received information in the last two years and for what purpose, under various legislative powers. All are provided with the information in accordance with the relevant Act, and no fee is levied.
Table 2 outlines organisations that have received information under Regulation 27(1 )(e) of the Road Vehicles (Registration and Licensing) Regulations 2002. Table 3 lists the reasons for the request. Both of these tables have also been placed in the House Libraries.
Any private organisation or individual listed will have been charged a fee of £2.50 per inquiry made. No fee is levied on public bodies.
Chris Grayling: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport when the new arrangements for driving licence fees will come into force. [71996]
Dr. Ladyman: Proposals for restructuring DVLA's fees are currently out for public consultation. The consultation period closes on 21 July 2006. Until we have analysed the responses to the consultation and agreed a way forward we cannot give a firm date for any changes there may be to driving licence fees.
Emergency Services
Chris Grayling: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how blue light driver training will be (a) delivered and (b) certified for members of the medical profession who provide volunteer assistance to the emergency services; and if he will make a statement. [71884]
Dr. Ladyman: Subject to parliamentary approval the Road Safety Bill will provide powers for us to quality assure the content and delivery of blue light training. The Driving Standards Agency will consult with stakeholders before any decisions are made as to how such training will be delivered or certified.
However, in the absence of a regulatory regime, DSA developed an agreed set of minimum core competencies for drivers of emergency vehicles. These were published in 2001 as the “Blue Light Users Working Party Expectations Document”. DSA had worked together with the ambulance and fire services, police and the Ministry of Defence to develop this document. It was agreed that each service should tailor any training based on these competencies to the needs of their own drivers and vehicles. The expectation document is available on the DSA website:
www.dsa.gov.uk
Finsbury Park Station
Jeremy Corbyn: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what plans his Department has to transfer the management of Finsbury Park station to Transport for London. [72977]
Derek Twigg: The Department for Transport has no plans to transfer the management of Finsbury Park station at present.
Highways Act
Mr. Amess: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will make a statement on the operation of section 161 of the Highways Act 1980; what recent representations he has received about the operation of this (a) section and (b) Act; what amendments have been made to the Act; and what plans he has to amend this Act. [72181]
Dr. Ladyman: Section 161 of the Highways Act 1980 deals with penalties for causing certain kinds of danger or annoyance to users of the highway. If a person
without lawful authority or excuse deposits anything whatsoever on a highway in consequence of which a user of the highway is injured or endangered, that person is guilty of an offence and liable to a fine.
In the last 12 months the Department has dealt with two representations from members of the public concerning this section.
The Highways Act 1980 contains more than 300 sections and 25 schedules. A large number of amendments have been made to the Highways Act in the last 26 years and the cost of collating a list would be disproportionate. As there is no central record of representations received by the Department that would enable officials to identify those about the operation of the whole Act, it would also incur disproportionate cost to do so.
However, section 161 subsections (1), (3) and (4) of the Highways Act 1980 were amended by sections 38 and 46 of the Criminal Justice Act 1982. These amendments raised the level of the fines. Section 161 subsection (2) was substituted by the Highways (Amendment) Act 1986 and relates to creating criminal offences in relation to lighting fires or discharging firearms or fireworks in the vicinity of the highway.
We have no plans to amend the Highways Act 1980.
Level Crossings
Mr. Carmichael: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many incidents have been recorded at level crossings in each year since 1997; and how many of these resulted in (a) death and (b) injury. [69601]
Derek Twigg: The information requested is in the following table.
| Incidents, death and injuries( 1) at level crossings on Britain's level crossings, 1997 to 2004( 2) | |||
| (a) Incidents | (b) Deaths | (c) Injuries | |
| (1) These figures do not include suicides. (2 )Figures taken from HMRI's annual reports on railway safety. (3) This is a nine-month report period as part of the transition to a European requirement that rail accident statistics be published on a calendar year basis. |
Ministerial Travel
David Simpson: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport (1) what the total cost was of overnight accommodation for Ministers of State in his Department on foreign visits in each of the last three years; [69079]
(2) on how many occasions Ministers of State in his Department stayed overnight in (a) five-star, (b) four-star and (c) three-star hotels on foreign visits in each of the last three years. [69080]
Dr. Ladyman: The total costs of accommodation outside the United Kingdom for all four Ministers in the Department for Transport undertaking official business, including the costs of any accompanying Private Secretaries, for each of the last three financial years are:
2003-04: £6,907
2004-05: £2,423
2005-06: £9,094.
Information about the category of any hotels at which Ministers have stayed is not held centrally.
Ministerial travel is conducted in accordance with the Ministerial Code and Travel by Ministers. When travelling on official business Ministers are expected to make efficient and cost-effective travel arrangements.
Since 1999 the Government have published an annual list of all visits overseas undertaken by Cabinet Ministers costing £500 or more during each financial year, this information includes accommodation costs. Copies are available in the Library.
MOT Fee
Chris Grayling: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport whether it is his policy that the maximum MOT fee will remain constant during the lifetime of this Parliament. [71821]
Dr. Ladyman: No. We intend to continue current policy which is to review MOT fees annually to take account of changes in cost such as inflation and any changes in the time it takes to conduct an average MOT test.
Motorways
Chris Grayling: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport (1) how many (a) vehicles and (b) heavy goods vehicles used the M6 toll motorway in each of the last 24 months; [72918]
(2) how many (a) vehicles and (b) heavy goods vehicles travelled on the M6 toll motorway on average each day in the last period for which figures are available. [72919]
Dr. Ladyman: The available information is contained in the following table. The figures have been taken from information provided on the website of Midlands Expressway Ltd., the operators of the toll road.
The company does not provide separate figures for heavy goods vehicles. The table gives average traffic figures for each month, broken down for workdays and weekends/public holidays, covering the period from the opening of the M6 Toll in December 2003 to April 2006.
| Month | Workdays | Weekends/public holidays | All days |
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