Asked by: Lord Birt (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Birt on 7 April (HL6027), what assessment they have made of how (1) the incidence of train cancellations, and (2) the reasons for train cancellations, compare with the operation of rail services in other G7 countries.
Answered by Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill - Minister of State (Department for Transport)
No assessment has been made on how the incidence of train cancellations and the reasons for train cancellations compare with the operation of rail services in other G7 countries.
The Independent Regulators’ Group Rail (IRG-Rail), publishes an annual Market Monitoring Report which includes European comparisons on various aspects such as infrastructure characteristics, punctuality, and traffic data for both freight and passenger services. This helps to benchmark performance, identify trends, and highlight differences and similarities among the participating countries. However, this report does not cover international comparisons of cancellations.
The Government is committed to reforming the railways, including establishing Great British Railways. This will end years of fragmentation by bringing together track and train to deliver for passengers with more reliable, better-quality services and simpler ticketing and fares.
Asked by: Lord Birt (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill on 24 March (HL6028), whether they will now answer the question put, namely whether they will conduct a strategic review of road construction, renewal and repair.
Answered by Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill - Minister of State (Department for Transport)
The Government has no plans to conduct a strategic review of this sort, but various initiatives are underway to update the guidance on the design, operation and maintenance of both the Strategic Road Network and local highways.
National Highways, for example, which is responsible for the Strategic Road Network (trunk motorways and major A roads) in England, is currently updating its Design Manual for Roads and Bridges (DMRB). The DMRB contains information about current design standards relating to the design, assessment, and operation of motorway and all-purpose trunk roads in the United Kingdom.
The Department for Transport is also starting the process of updating the UK Roads Leadership Group’s guidance document Well-Managed Highway Infrastructure: A Code of Practice. This will provide new guidance to local highway authorities on how best to look after their local highway networks, and the Department will engage with the local highway sector as appropriate as the review progresses.
Asked by: Lord Birt (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government what percentage of trains on Network Rail are (1) cancelled, and (2) arrive more than five minutes later than timetabled, and what proportion of these cancellations and delays are caused by (a) signal failure, (b) lack of crew availability, and (c) other reasons.
Answered by Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill - Minister of State (Department for Transport)
(1) The Office of Rail and Road (ORR) reported that in the 12 months up to December 2024 the cancellation measure was 4.0%.
(2) The ORR publish train punctuality on a quarterly basis. They report trains arriving within 59 seconds, within 3 minutes or within 15 minutes of their scheduled arrival time. These are reported in Table 1.
Table 1. Train punctuality in the year ending December 2024, Great Britain
Trains arriving within 59 seconds | Trains arriving within 3 minutes | Trains arriving within 15 minutes |
67.0% | 84.8% | 98.2% |
Source: ORR Table 3133: Delay minutes by operator and cause
The proportion of cancellations by the available causes is report in Table 2.
Table 2. Train Cancellations by cause and responsibility in the year ending December 2024, Great Britain
Infrastructure and network management | Infrastructure owner external event |
|
|
26.0% | 18.6% | 51.4% | 3.9% |
Source: DfT analysis of ORR Table 3123: Trains planned and cancellations by operator and cause
Information on the cause of delays is published by Rail Period by the ORR. This information is reported in delay minutes. The latest data (covering 3 March 2024 – 2 March 2025) on the proportion of delays minutes attributed by the available causes is reported in Table 3.
Table 3. Share of delay minutes by cause in the year ending 2 March 2025, Great Britain
| |
NR-on-TOC | |
External | 14% |
Network Management / Other | 16% |
Non-Track Assets | 17% |
Severe Weather, Autumn, & Structures | 7% |
Track | 7% |
NR-on-TOC total | 61% |
TOC-on-Self and TOC-on-TOC | |
Fleet | 15% |
Operations | 3% |
Stations | 3% |
TOC Other | 7% |
Traincrew | 10% |
TOC-on-Self total | 39% |
Source: DfT analysis of Office of Rail and Road Table 3184 - Delay minutes by operator and cause | |
Asked by: Lord Birt (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will conduct a strategic review of road construction, renewal and repair to identify the most economic approach to reduce potholes and costs to road users caused by potholes.
Answered by Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill - Minister of State (Department for Transport)
It is the responsibility of individual highway authorities to maintain and improve their networks, based upon their local knowledge, circumstances, and priorities. This includes decisions on how best to prevent road surfaces from deteriorating in the most economic way. The Government is committed to updating its guidance to local highway authorities on how to manage their networks, which will include advice on matters of this sort.
For 2025/26, the Government is providing almost £1.6 billion for local highway maintenance, an increase of £500 million compared to 2024/25. Funding is not ring-fenced, and it is a matter for local authorities to determine how the money is best spent. The Department for Transport has written to all local highway authorities asking them to demonstrate that they are complying with certain criteria aimed at driving best practice and continual improvement. The Department will assess the information provided by local highway authorities in due course.
Asked by: Lord Birt (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the safety implications of passenger aircrafts landing at airports during Storm Eowyn.
Answered by Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill - Minister of State (Department for Transport)
The safety of the traveling public is a priority for the Government. Whether or not it is safe to land at an airport is an operational decision between the aircraft operator, air traffic controllers, and ultimately the pilot in command of an aircraft.
UK aviation operates predominately in the private sector, with each airline responsible for its own severe weather plans, tailored to specific operations, locations, and infrastructure.
Asked by: Lord Birt (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they have any plans to require all providers of publicly available electric vehicle charging points to enable contactless payment.
Answered by Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill - Minister of State (Department for Transport)
The Government is committed to ensuring that public charging is accessible for all, and it is vital that consumers can charge hassle-free. Under the Public Charge Point Regulations 2023 chargepoint operators are required to offer contactless payment options for all new chargepoints of 8 kW and above, as well as all chargepoints of 50 kW and above, old and new.
These regulations have been designed to ensure that contactless payment methods are available across a large part of the public charge point network, where they will bring most significant and immediate benefits to consumers.
Asked by: Lord Birt (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the RAC's estimate that there were over one million potholes on UK roads in 2023, as set out in the RAC Pothole Index, published on 23 April 2024; what plans they have to review and identify the most effective methods of road construction for reducing the number of potholes that form; and what plans they have to review and identify the optimum techniques and technologies available for filling in potholes when they do occur.
Answered by Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill - Minister of State (Department for Transport)
RAC’s pothole estimate was based on 81 local authority responses to a Freedom of Information request carried out in 2023. The Department agrees that pothole formation occurs more frequently in the winter months, where increased water and ice cause ingress and subsequent road defects to occur.
Whilst the Department does not require notification when highway authorities discover, receive reports of, or repair individual defects on the local highway network, local highway authorities are required to provide road condition information to the Department annually as part of the data obligations set out in the Single Data List. The Department publishes this information on gov.uk as part of its annual statistical releases.
This Government takes the condition of local roads very seriously and is committed to maintaining and renewing the local highway network. At Budget 2024, the Chancellor announced an extra £500 million for local highway maintenance for the 2025/26 financial year, an increase of nearly 50% compared to the current financial year. The Government will confirm funding allocations to English local highway authorities in due course.
The Department for Transport (DfT) allocates this funding to local highways authorities so they can most effectively spend this funding on maintaining and improving their respective network, based upon their local knowledge, circumstances, and priorities. It is up to the respective highway authority how best to spend this funding to fulfil their statutory duty under Section 41 of the Highways Act 1980, but the DfT strongly advocates a risk-based whole lifecycle asset management approach to local authority highways maintenance programmes. This considers all parts of the highway network, such as bridges, cycleways, and lighting columns, and not just the fixing of potholes.
Asked by: Lord Birt (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have to review the (1) design, and (2) safety of major roundabouts with multiple lanes, entrances and exits.
Answered by Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill - Minister of State (Department for Transport)
Whether a roundabout is suitable for any location is entirely a matter for the relevant highway authority to decide upon, taking into account local factors including safety. They are also responsible for reviewing any such installations should concerns arise. National Highways publishes detailed advice on the design of roundabouts in the ‘Design Manual for Roads and Bridges (DMRB)’. Use of DMRB is mandatory for the Strategic Road Network, but is available as guidance for all highway authorities.
Asked by: Lord Birt (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many signal failures there were on the rail system in the last year for which data are available; and how the rate of failure in the UK compares with rail systems in other leading countries.
Answered by Lord Davies of Gower - Shadow Minister (Home Office)
The Network Rail metric for signalling failures indicates there were 2,936 signal failures on the rail system in Great Britain for the period 2023 to 2024. Network Rail does not hold data on how the rate of signal failures compares with other countries.
Asked by: Lord Birt (Crossbench - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask His Majesty's Government what percentage of trains on Network Rail did not arrive at their destination on time in the last four-weekly period for which data are available.
Answered by Lord Davies of Gower - Shadow Minister (Home Office)
In the period 7 January to 3 February 2024, 66.7% of recorded station stops in Great Britain arrived ‘On Time’ (early or less than one minute after the scheduled time).