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Departmental Estate
Mr. Amess: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what (a) land and (b) property his Department owns in the Southend, West constituency. [41749]
Ms Buck: The Department owns no land or property in the Southend, West constituency.
Insurance Certificates (Display)
Mr. Gordon Prentice: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport if he will make it mandatory for certificates of insurance to be displayed on the windscreens of vehicles. [45971]
Dr. Ladyman: We are not persuaded that a windscreen disc would help reduce uninsured driving and have no plans to make them mandatory. During 2004 Professor David Greenaway of Nottingham University carried out a review of motor insurance arrangements in the UK to see what could be done to tackle the problem of uninsured driving.
He considered windscreen insurance discs but reached the conclusion that they were unlikely to have any significant or long-term impact on uninsured driving and did not recommend them.
Ladbroke Grove Crash
Tom Brake: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport pursuant to the answer of 6 December 2005, Official Report, columns 1857–58W, on the Ladbroke Grove crash, when he expects the remaining four recommendations from public inquiry reports to be implemented. [41846]
Derek Twigg: The four outstanding recommendations and the anticipated completion dates are:
2.The selective fitment of GSM-R (a radio system) in advance of ETCS fitment to trains should be considered.
Network Rail is implementing GSM-R across the network, starting with Strathclyde during 2006 with full national completion due in 2012.
4.Suppliers of products or services of a safety-critical kind should be required to hold an accreditation but the features of such a system require further study.
The Railway Industry Supplier Approval Scheme is scheduled to be rolled out throughout 2006, starting in March.
Marine Environment
Emily Thornberry: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport when he plans (a) to announce the location of marine environment high risk areas in waters within UK jurisdiction and (b) to consult on the proposed protective measures for these areas.[R] [45494]
Dr. Ladyman: We will make an announcement on marine environmental high risk areas (MEHRAs) shortly.
Maritime and Coastguard Agency
Mr. Sanders: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what the national targets are for the Maritime and Coastguard Agency; and what the performance of offices in South Devon is in relation to those targets. [46615]
Dr. Ladyman: The Maritime and Coastguard Agency's Ministerial Targets for the 2005–06 business year appear on page 19 of the agency's annual plan and accounts 2005, which is also available on the agency's website, www.mcga.gov.uk. They focus on search and rescue response times, ship survey and inspection targets and other projects, including prevention.
Agency performance against these targets will be published in the MCA's annual plan and accounts 2006, following audit and ministerial scrutiny, but performance of specific offices are not published.
P-plate Scheme
Mr. Clifton-Brown: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport (1) what consultations his Department undertook on introducing a compulsory probationary P-plate scheme for newly-qualified drivers; [45606]
(2) what steps his Department has taken to encourage take-up of the P-plate scheme among newly-qualified drivers. [45608]
Dr. Ladyman: A compulsory P-plate scheme was one of the options discussed in the Department's consultation paper, A Structured Approach to Learning to Drive", published in 2002. The decision letter responding to that consultation, published in August 2004, explained that Ministers had decided against additional regulation of newly-qualified drivers, and no further work has therefore been done on a P-plate scheme. Copies of the consultation paper and the decision letter were placed in the Library of the House and are also available online at—http://www.dft.gov.uk/stellent/groups/dft_control/documents/contentserver template/dft_index.hcst?n=10204&l=2.
The Department also commissioned research in September 2003 on the likely impact of a trial P-plate scheme, during which free plates would be issued to all those passing the practical driving test. This study found
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so much resistance to P-plate use within the target population, however, that the trial itself was abandoned. A short report on this project will be published by the Department in due course.
Road Building
Mr. Ancram: To ask the Secretary of State for Transport what public expenditure per head on new road building was in each of the counties of England for (a) 2004–05 and (b) 2005–06 in descending order; and what the planned spending is for 2006–07 in each case. [42317]
Dr. Ladyman: The Department for Transport does not hold centrally information on all public expenditure per head on new road building.
The following tables contain public expenditure per head in each year for those authorities/counties in England which have new Highways Agency roads or local authority roads built at a cost of £5 million of more. There are separate Highways Agency and local authority programmes of expenditure on road improvements costing less than £5 million. However, it is not possible to identify separately within these programmes new road building schemes from other types of road improvement. Therefore this information is not included.
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