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Mr. Wray : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what is the 1991, 1992 and 1993 amount of public funds
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given to British Rail to improve passenger and goods access from Scotland to the continent via the channel tunnel.Mr. Freeman : British Rail plans to invest up to £1.4 billion on works linked to the channel tunnel in this financial year and the next two. BR's investment is financed from a combination of internal and external finance, including borrowing. Section 42 of the Channel Tunnel Act forbids Government subsidy for international rail services.
Mr. Gregory : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will set out figures for rail investment, in cash and real terms, for the last 20 years, and the estimate for next year.
Mr. Freeman : Actual figures up to 1990-91 are listed in the table :
Rail Investment
Year |Cash |1990-91
|£ million|Prices
|£ million
------------------------------------------------
1970 |48 |329
1971 |59 |371
1972 |73 |424
1973 |81 |440
1974 |103 |468
1975 |157 |568
1976 |176 |561
1977 |193 |541
1978 |208 |526
1979 |248 |537
1980 |304 |556
1981 |277 |462
1982 |243 |379
1983 |252 |375
<1>1984-85 |280 |397
1985-86 |399 |536
1986-87 |399 |519
1987-88 |526 |648
1988-89 |545 |626
1989-90 |696 |752
1990-91 |<2>822 |822
<1> 12 month equivalent.
<2> Estimated outturn.
The definition of rail investment includes
investment in
Freightliners, British Rail Maintenance Ltd.
and British Rail
Engineering Ltd. but excludes the laying of
continuous welded track
which BR do not now classify as investment.
Plans for this financial year and the next two--1991-92, 1992-93 and 1993- 94--are given in the departmental report 1991 (Cm. 1507).
Motorway Lighting
21. Mr. Flynn : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what plans he has for improving and extending the lighting on the M4 and other motorways.
Mr. Chope : The lighting requirements on all motorways in England, including the M4, are kept under continuous review. Plans are in hand for more lighting on the M1, M5, M20, M40, M56 and on the M62. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Wales is responsible for the M4 motorway in Wales.
Mr. Flynn : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what is his most recent estimate of the potential safety improvements and increased capacity of motorways resulting from the installation of lighting.
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Mr. Chope : Research in this country and elsewhere has shown that the average reduction in night-time accidents attributable to road lighting is about 30 per cent. There is, however, substantial variation between locations, depending on type of road and other factors. Evidence is not available on the effect of lighting on motorway capacity.Rail Services (South-East)
22. Sir Michael Neubert : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport when he next expects to meet the chairman of British Rail to discuss rail services in the south-east.
Mr. Freeman : My right hon. and learned Friend and I frequently discuss NSE services with the chairman of British Rail.
London Regional Transport
23. Mr. Cohen : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport whether he will increase the funding for London Regional Transport for 1991-92.
Mr. Freeman : The Government are reviewing the level of funding required by London Transport in 1991-92. An announcement will be made as soon as possible.
Mr. Harry Greenway : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many passengers travelled on London Transport on average (a) in 1990, (b) five years ago and (c) 15 years ago ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Freeman : The information requested is given in the table.
Passenger journeys on London Transport
million
Year |Underground |Buses<1> |Docklands Light
|Railway
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1975 |601 |1,455 |Nil
1985 |740 |1,154 |Nil
1990 |775 |1,220 |8.2
<1>Including tendered services.
London Underground (Crime)
24. Mr. Carrington : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will give the latest figures for violent crimes on the London Underground.
Mr. Freeman : I was pleased to announce on 20 March that violent crime on London Underground has been reduced for the third successive year. In 1990, there were 1,341 violent crimes recorded on the underground--a reduction of 23 per cent. on the previous year--while passengers made some 800 million journeys.
A2 Roadworks
23. Mr. Jacques Arnold : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will make a statement on the interruption of traffic during the roadworks on the A2 from the M2 to London, since 1990.
Mr. Chope : The roadworks concerned are part of a phased programme of contracts to carry out essential major maintenance and provide hard shoulders along the whole of the A2 trunk road in north-west Kent between the London boundary and the M2 Motorway.
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I regret that works of this magnitude on such a heavily trafficked road inevitably cause some degree of disturbance. But my Department will continue to take all practicable measures to keep inconvenience and delay to a minimum, compatible with the safety both of the public and the road operatives.Channel Tunnel
26. Mr. Simon Hughes : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he has received from British Rail any proposals on the location of the recent London terminus for the channel tunnel, in the light of the Government's declared commitment to the Chelsea-Hackney crossrail.
Mr. Freeman : British Rail's study of alternative routes for a high- speed rail link to the channel tunnel includes the siting of a second London terminal. We expect to receive the board's proposals soon.
Mr. Andrew F. Bennett : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport when he next expects to meet the chairman of British Rail to discuss a channel tunnel freight terminal in Greater Manchester.
Mr. Freeman : I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave him on 11 March.
East Coast Motorway
27. Mr. Hinchliffe : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what steps he has taken to consider the possible environmental consequences of the construction of the proposed east coast motorway.
Mr. Chope : Proposals for an east coast motorway were the subject of a feasibility study commissioned by a consortium of local authorities and private sector organisations. This Department was not involved.
Airlines
28. Mr. Steen : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what is the Government's policy towards maintaining a multi-airline industry in the United Kingdom.
Mr. McLoughlin : The Government's policy is to promote free and fair competition in aviation, so that there remains a healthy, competitive airline industry in the United Kingdom which meets the needs of users. The market is diverse enough to sustain a variety of United Kingdom-based carriers as well as their foreign competitors.
Drink Driving
Mr. Peter Bottomley : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how many awards have been won by the advertising campaign to reduce drink driving.
Mr. Chope : The Christmas 1990 campaign won two major awards last week in the British television advertising awards 1991. Twelve other major awards have been won by the "Drinking and Driving Wrecks Lives" campaign since 1987.
Mr. Peter Bottomley : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport how long it usually takes for information to be made publicly available as to whether a driver had been drinking alcohol before driving and being killed.
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Mr. Peter Lloyd : I have been asked to reply.It is possible for information about whether a driver killed in a road accident had consumed alcohol to become publicly available in a variety of circumstances, for example, during criminal proceedings against someone else involved in the same accident. But such information is most likely to emerge from any publicity given to a coroners' inquest into the death of the driver if the coroner, who is an independent judicial officer, admits evidence of this nature at the hearing. The date of any inquest is a matter for the coroner to decide and the length of time between the death and the inquest will vary according to the circumstances of each individual case.
A66
Mr. Jopling : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will give a time scale for all the improvements to the A66 Scotch Corner-Penrith road which he had in mind.
Mr. Chope : There are three schemes in the road programme for the A66 between Scotch Corner and Penrith with a current timetable as follows :
Bowes to County Boundary
Under construction
Expected completion--Autumn 1992
Stainsmore to Banksgate
Order Publication--Summer 1991
Start of Works--Spring 1993
Stainburn to Great Clifton
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Order Publication--Summer 1992Start of Works--Summer 1994
Environmental Assessment Studies
Ms. Walley : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what plans there are to update the manual of environmental appraisal to include the issues raised by the European Community's directive on environmental assessment ; and if he intends to consult outside organisations on this matter.
Mr. Chope : It is a measure of the comprehensiveness of the manual of environmental appraisal that no changes were necessary to implement in full the European Council directive on environmental assessment (85/337/EEC).
A13
Mr. Cohen : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what plans there are for changes to the A13 highway ; and whether there will be an opportunity for the public to object and a public inquiry held into any of its stages.
Mr. Chope : A number of improvements are under way or planned for the A13 trunk road. These are listed in the table. Where there is a need for orders under the Highways Act or legislation relating to compulsory purchase the public will have the opportunity to object after draft orders are published. Depending on the status, number and content of those objections the Secretary of State will decide whether to hold a public inquiry.
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Improvements to A13 trunk road
|Nature of improvement
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A13/Butcher Row |Junction improvement | -
A13/West India Dock Road (Interim) |Junction improvement | -
A13/West India Dock Road (Final) |Junction improvement |Side Roads/CP0
A13/Blackwall Tunnel Cotton Street |Junction improvement |CPO
A13/Leamouth Road |Junction improvement/Widening| -
A13/Ironbridge/Canning Town Flyover |Widening/New Junction |Line/Side Roads Orders/CPO
A13/A112 Prince Regent Lane |Junction improvement |Line/Side Roads Orders/CPO
| Exchange Land Certificate
A13//A117 Woolwich Manor Way |Junction improvement |Line/Side Roads Orders/CPO
| Exchange Land Certificate
A13/Movers Lane |Junction improvement |Line/Side Roads Orders/CPO
A13/West of Heathrow to Mar Dyke |New Trunk Road |Line/Side Roads Orders/CPO/
| Detrunking
Ms. Gordon : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will tabulate in the Official Report all road works under way and which will be undertaken on the A13 Commercial road and East India Dock road between Aldgate and Canning Town until the end of 1991 ; and what are the estimated consequential minimum flows of traffic in each direction in passenger car units per hour for each phase of the works.
Mr. Chope : The A13 Commercial road from Aldgate to Butcher Row is the responsibility of the London borough of Tower Hamlets. The Department has two schemes under way this year on the A13 between Butcher Row and Canning Town. One is at the junction with West India Dock road where there are five remaining works phases. A minimum of one lane in each direction will be kept open, widening to two lanes at the approaches to the traffic signals. The second is at Leamouth road which has two remaining works phases with a minimum of two lanes in each direction. The capacity of a lane under these
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circumstances is about 1,500 passenger car units per hour, although these figures are likely to be constrained by the junctions. There will be three areas of resurfacing with renewal of footways and other essential maintenance works including work by statutory undertakers which may affect traffic flows from time to time.Tolls
Mr. Cohen : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will list all tolls charged on roads within the responsibility of his Department, and the recipients of the income.
Mr. Chope : The only tolled facility for which the Department is entirely responsible is the Severn bridge on the M4. Tolls are £1 for cars and £2 for HGVs. The income accrues to the Exchequer.
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There are other tolled crossings, for which the Department is not responsible, which link trunk roads or motorways. They are :Column 353
Tolls
Location |Car |HGV |Recipient of toll income
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dartford Tunnels (A282/M25) |80p |£ 2.10 |Dartford River Crossing Ltd.
Humber Bridge (A15) |£ 1.60 |£ 6.50-£ 10.90 |Humber Bridge Board
Tyne Tunnel (A1) |50p |£ 1.00 |Tyne and Wear PTA
Tamar Bridge (A38) |40p |£ 1.35-£ 1.80 |Tamar Bridge and Torpoint
| Ferry Joint Committee
Selby Bridge (A19-A63) |7p |<1>6p |Company of Proprietors of Selby Bridge
Dunham Bridge (A57) |15p |10p per axle |Dunham Bridge Company
<1>per tonne (gross weight)
Jubilee Line
Mr. Cohen : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what is the total level of grant from his Department to London Transport for the Jubilee line extension ; if he will list its distribution by year ; and for each year what percentage it is of the total London Transport grant allocation.
Mr. Freeman : In Common with other public expenditure, the grant to be paid to LT is determined only for a three-year forward period. Figures have therefore only been settled for the years up to 1993-94. These are as follows :
|1990-91|1991-92|1992-93|1993-94
------------------------------------------------------------
£ million |40 |121 |251 |376
Percentage of total
grant to LT |7 |18 |33 |36
Trunk Roads
Ms. Walley : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport whom he intends to consult on the Standing Advisory Committee on Trunk Road Assessment report before formulating policies to implement any recommendations.
Mr. Chope : The Department will consult interested parties before implementing major changes to the values or underlying principle of the inputs to trunk road scheme appraisal. SACTRA itself has already consulted widely in preparing its report on environmental assessment.
Ms. Walley : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport when he expects the Standing Advisory Committee on Trunk Road Assessment to report on its review of environmental evaluation ; and if he will give the working title and the anticipated title of the report.
Mr. Chope : The report from SACTRA is now not expected until late summer. The title of the report has not been decided.
Mr. Dalyell : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what action he is taking in respect of the report of the Standing Advisory Committee on Trunk Road Assessment on the prospect of nature conservation in the appraisal of trunk roads.
Mr. Chope : The report from SACTRA has not yet been received and is now not expected until late summer.
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M66
Sir Thomas Arnold : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport whether there will be a further public inquiry into the M66 line order at the M66/A664 interchange ; and if he will make a statement.
Mr. Chope : Yes. While the route of the motorway is fixed a new connecting roads order for the M66/A664 junction was published last January. The inquiry will provide an opportunity for interested persons to comment on or object to those proposals.
Drivers (Qualifying Age)
Mr. Gareth Wardell : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he has any plans to change the qualifying age to enable people to drive a motor vehicle in the United Kingdom.
St John Ambulance Brigade
Mr. Redmond : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what facilities he has made available to staff in his Department to contribute to the appeal that has been launched for people with the name of John to help raise £5 million for the St. John Ambulance Brigade.
Mr. Chope : My Department is in contact with the St. John Ambulance Brigade and will be giving publicity to the "Over to you, John" appeal through its in-house journal.
Disabled People
Mr. Hannam : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what reports he has received recently from the Disabled Persons Transport Advisory Committee ; and what response he has made to them.
Mr. Freeman : I have received two reports this year. "Information and Mobility" presents the findings of a public hearing held by the committee in March 1990 on the importance of information and communications in enabling disabled people to travel. The second report, "Mobility for Britain's Entire Population", develops the committee's views on future policy direction towards achieving a public transport system which is fully accessible to disabled people.
These latest reports, together with earlier reports from the committee, are being studied and will contribute significantly to my Department's thinking in this area.
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Highway Code
Mr. Flynn : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what measures he plans to introduce to inform drivers of the contents of the Highway Code.
Mr. Chope : It is the responsibility of all road users to be aware of the contents of the Highway Code. The code is already widely available through HMSO, booksellers and an increasing number of other retail outlets. The Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency also supplies copies on request to applicants for provisional driving licences. My Department takes every opportunity to promote increased public awareness of the safety measures in the code.
Severn Bridge
Mr. Alan Williams : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport on the basis of the toll assumptions in the table in clause 9 of the Severn Bridges Bill, when payment for the present Severn bridge will be completed and what will be the assumed gross income in the final year ; and on the basis of the same table, what is the assumed income of the present bridge in 1992, 1993, 1994 and 1995.
Mr. Chope : I very much regret that due to an administrative error there was a delay in responding to the right hon. Member's earlier questions on this subject. I can now refer him to the answer I gave him on 18 April, columns 214-15 .
Learner Drivers
Mr. Burt : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport (1) what steps he is taking to raise the level of public awareness of the changes to the law resulting from regulations coming into force on 1 October 1990 concerning the supervision of learner drivers ; (2) what steps he is taking to monitor public awareness of the changes to the law resulting from regulations coming into force on 1 October 1990 concerning the supervision of learner drivers.
Mr. Chope [holding answer 16 April 1991] : The regulations were drawn up after extensive consultation, and three separate press notices were issued to publicise their introduction, which were widely reported.
In addition, details of the new qualifying conditions for supervising drivers are set out in a leaflet which is issued with all new provisional driving licences. The leaflet stresses that it is the responsibility of the learner driver to ensure that the supervising driver is appropriately qualified and points out that it is an offence for both parties if those conditions are not met. The new requirement is also set out on the provisional licence itself, and described in the guide for learner drivers, "Your Driving Test", published by the Driving Standards Agency.
M20
Mr. Speed : To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he now has an opening date for the M20 motorway Ashford to Hollingbourne section.
Mr. Chope [holding answer 19 April 1991] : The M20 motorway between Maidstone and Ashford is being built
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under two contracts. The first is due for completion this month, but cannot be opened until the second contract is ready. The second contract is due for completion in July, but work is ahead of programme and I now hope that it will be possible for the road to be opened before July.I shall inform my hon. Friend as soon as an opening date is fixed.
ENVIRONMENT
Lambeth Council
Mr. Fraser : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment (1) what are the current debts for rent and rates owed to Lambeth council which have not been written off ;
(2) what part of the budget of Lambeth council of £315.5 million for 1991-92 represents payment of interest on moneys borrowed against (a) rent arrears and (b) rate and poll tax arrears ;
(3) how much money is currently borrowed by Lambeth council against (a) rent arrears and (b) rate and poll tax arrears and exclusive of the additional sums which he has permitted Lambeth to borrow.
Mr. Key : On the latest information provided to my Department by the council, Lambeth is owed £28.9 million in respect of rents, £28.0 million in respect of domestic rates and £13.7 million in respect of business rates.
It is not possible to provide the further information requested by the hon. Member since local authority debt is managed corporately and loans are not raised against particular assets.
Emissions
Mr. Simon Hughes : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will make it his policy to press for existing EC directives on sulphur dioxide and nitrogen dioxide to be revised to reflect World Health Organisation guidelines.
Mr. Baldry : The preambles to the present directives make it clear that the limit values for which they provide are based on work by the World Health Organisation.
Mr. Simon Hughes : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how many nitrogen oxide monitoring stations there are in the United Kingdom ; what is the average number of such stations amongst the EC nations ; and how many such stations there are in (a) Holland and (b) Japan.
Mr. Baldry : My Department funds 12 nitrogen oxide samplers in the United Kingdom, seven of which are for the purposes of the European directive on nitrogen dioxide. The number of directive sites in other EC countries is as follows :
|Number
--------------------------
Belgium |21
Germany |200
Denmark |11
Spain |15
France |85
Greece |33
Ireland |6
Italy |34
Luxembourg |4
Netherlands |53
Portugal |17
I understand that in 1989 there were 1,337 nitrogen oxide monitoring sites in Japan.
Mr. Simon Hughes : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment if he will list the sites used for the monitoring of sulphur dioxide (a) in 1982 and (b) in 1991.
Mr. Baldry : I am arranging for a list of these sites to be placed in the Library.
Estate Action Schemes
Mr. Devlin : To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how much money has been spent each year since 1987 under the estate action scheme in (a) Stockton, (b) Middlesbrough and (c) Hartlepool ; and how many dwellings have been improved or created.
Mr. Yeo : The table shows the amounts approved by the Department under the estate action scheme in each financial year since 1986-87 in respect of Stockton, Middlesbrough and Hartlepool.
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