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Motorway Traffic Officers

Mr. Wood: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what plans he has to introduce motorway traffic officers to the (a) M62, (b) M1, (c) M606 and (d) M621 motorway in West Yorkshire. [189498]

Mr. Jamieson: The programme for implementation of the traffic officer service in West Yorkshire on the M62, M1, M606 and M621 will commence in autumn 2005.

Ports

Mrs. Dunwoody: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport when his Department intends to conclude the updating of The Project Appraisal Framework for Ports, published in 2003. [189099]

Mr. Jamieson: The Government announced its intention to update the Project Appraisal Framework for Ports in paragraph 7.29 of the Future of Transport White Paper. This will form part of the review of the ports policy framework to be launched after autumn 2005.

Mrs. Dunwoody: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will make a statement on the Autumn 2005 review date for a response to the global growth in shipping traffic and new port capacity. [189106]

Mr. Jamieson: We expect that, by Autumn 2005, the Secretary of State for Transport will have taken decisions on the proposals for major container port development currently outstanding and due to be determined by him. As the Secretary of State said in his statement to the House on 20 July we intend to take a long-term approach to port development and will
 
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review the policy framework for ports by the end of next year. Para 7.28 of The Future of Transport makes clear that one of the key issues that the review will show we should respond to forecast global growth in shipping traffic by providing new port capacity.

Railways

Mr. Yeo: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what the cost implications are of giving control over the railways in the Greater London Authority area to the Mayor of London; and if he will make a statement. [186722]

Mr. Darling: "The Future of Rail" white paper set out proposals for the Mayor to be able to buy additional services or propose savings on rail services in London. Transport for London would pay any additional costs (or recoup any savings).

The white paper also set out a number of issues in respect of London for further consideration or work. Assessing the cost implications of the various options will be an important part of this further work.

Mr. Jenkins: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what Government subsidy was given to rail providers for the last year for which figures are available; and what it was calculated to be (a) per passenger and (b) per passenger mile. [189575]

Mr. McNulty: Details of subsidy paid to each train operator in 2003–04 are set out in Appendix 3 to the Strategic Rail Authority's annual report 2003–04. Total numbers of passenger journeys made with each train operator in 2003–04 are shown in Section 8 of the Strategic Rail Authority's National Rail Trends Yearbook 2003–04. Details of subsidy per passenger kilometre travelled with each train operator in 2003–04 are set out in Appendix 5 to the Strategic Rail Authority's annual report 2003–04.

Copies of the annual report and the yearbook are available in the Libraries of the House.

Roads

Mr. Yeo: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what the level of road congestion on (a) motorways and (b) all roads has been in each year since 1997. [186853]

Mr. Darling: The measure that has been used is derived from comparing actual traffic speeds with those that would be achievable in the absence of congestion. Full details of the methodology are available on the Department's website at www.dft.gov.uk/stellent/groups/dft transstats/documents/page/dft transstats 021863.pdf

Under this measure the estimated average congestion delay on motorways in England was 3.8 seconds lost per vehicle kilometre in 2000. Congestion in large urban areas in England was estimated as 24.8 seconds lost per vehicle kilometre in 2000 and 24.9 seconds lost per vehicle kilometre in 2002. These are the latest figures currently available. Estimates have not been made for years prior to 2000.

The Department has always acknowledged the limitations of measuring congestion in this way and is currently developing new, more detailed data sources and new measures of traffic congestion.
 
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John Thurso: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what his estimate is of the total cost to the Government of public expenditure on road investment taken from the Capital Departmental Expenditure limit, but excluding capital grants to the private sector within the Resource Department Expenditure Limit, in each year from 2001–02 to 2010–11 (a) at outturn prices and (b) at today's prices. [164715]

Mr. Jamieson: Figures for outturn and forecast public expenditure on road investment on the English strategic roads network within the Department's Capital Departmental Expenditure Limit to 2005–06 are set out in the following table. Future spending is being reviewed as part of the Spending Review 2004 and announcements about spending levels beyond 2005–06 will be announced in due course.

The expenditure in 2001–02 and 2002–03 is higher since in those years structural maintenance was scored as capital expenditure. From 2003–04 onwards it scores as resource expenditure to bring the statistical treatment for budgeting purposes into line with accounting practice under Resource Accounting and Budgeting (RAB).
£ million

Financial year	Outturn prices	2003–04 prices
2001–02	1,022	1,086
2002–03	1,081	1,111
2003–04	649	649
2004–05	799	781
2005–06	563	537

The Government's policy as set out in "A New Deal for transport: Better for Everyone" (1998 Cm 3950) is that there are a number of trunk roads which mainly serve local and regional traffic and are more appropriately managed at local level. Therefore the Highways Agency has been transferring responsibility (together with an appropriate level of resources) over to local highway authorities to enable decisions to be better integrated with local transport and land use planning issues. The result will be to reduce the trunk road network by 30 per cent. or around 3,000 km in total. So far about two thirds of these roads have been detrunked. The data have not been adjusted to take this into account.

Trunk roads (excluding motorways) within Greater London were transferred to Transport for London in July 2000.

US Visas

Mr. Carmichael: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport pursuant to his Answer of 13 September 2004, Official Report, column 1389W, on US visas, what form representations to US authorities on the abolition of the crew list visa scheme have taken; what further representations the Government intends to make; and if he will make a statement on this proposal. [189535]

Mr. Jamieson: The representations referred to, took the form of two submissions to the US State Department. The first letter, in February 2003, on
 
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behalf of the UK and a number of other governments, put forward arguments in favour of retaining the crew list waiver scheme. A second letter was sent in September 2003 seeking to ameliorate the effects of the US proposals. We have no current plans to make further specific representations, but shall keep the matter under review.

The US proposals are based on a judgment by a sovereign government about the appropriate immigration and border controls to meet, inter alia, their national security requirements.

TRADE AND INDUSTRY

Bogus Prizes

Mr. Hancock: To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry if she will regulate the practice of offering bogus prizes, via tickets and scratch cards, which have to be claimed using expensive premium telephone lines; and if she will make a statement. [187749]

Mr. Mike O'Brien: The practice of offering bogus prizes to be claimed using premium rate telephone lines is already regulated by the Independent Committee for the Supervision of Standards of Telephone Information Services (ICSTIS) through a Code of Practice approved by the Communications regulator, the Office of Communications (Ofcom).

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