Asked by: Debbie Abrahams (Labour - Oldham East and Saddleworth)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment she has made of the potential impact of regional variations in the level of public transport provision on (a) the number of people who rely on cars and (b) levels of rural poverty.
Answered by Simon Lightwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Government knows how important reliable public transport services are in enabling people to stay connected and access education, work and vital services across the country. We also know that local bus services can be a lifeline in rural areas and can be the only means for communities to stay connected.
The Government is taking ambitious steps to improve local bus services across the country, including introducing the Bus Services Act 2025 which puts passenger needs, reliable services and local accountability at the heart of local bus services by putting the power back in the hands of local leaders right across England.
We also recently confirmed long-term investment of over £3 billion from 2026/27 to support local leaders and bus operators across the country to improve bus services for millions of passengers. This includes multi-year allocations for local authorities under the Local Authority Bus Grant (LABG) totalling nearly £700 million per year, ending the short-term approach to bus funding and giving councils the certainty they need to plan ahead to improve services for local communities. LABG allocations have been calculated using a fair and transparent approach that considers population size, levels of deprivation, the extent of existing bus services, and rurality.
Greater Manchester Combined Authority will be allocated £133.5 million under the LABG from 2026/27 to 2028/29. This is in addition to the £46.8 million they are already receiving under the LABG this financial year.
The Department for Transport has developed and published a Connectivity Tool to measure people’s ability to get where they want and need to go, using walking, cycling and public transport to reach jobs, shops, schools, healthcare and other essential services in any location in England and Wales. The Connectivity Tool combines transport and land use data to generate a national measure of connectivity and provides new insights to those developing new transport schemes or planning for growth to more easily understand how new transport infrastructure can impact an area’s connectivity.
As announced in the Child Poverty Strategy, published on 5 December 2025, the Government will also develop a transport poverty tool, which will aim to capture where poor transport connectivity and affordability limits people’s access to employment and essential services.
Asked by: Debbie Abrahams (Labour - Oldham East and Saddleworth)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to recommendation seven of the report entitled Roads Policing: Not optional - An inspection of roads policing in England and Wales by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue Services published in May 2020, what recent progress her Department has made with Cabinet colleagues on reviewing Circular 01/2007 on Use of speed and red-light cameras for traffic enforcement: guidance on deployment, visibility and signing; and when he plans to publish the review.
Answered by Richard Holden - Shadow Secretary of State for Transport
The Department is currently preparing a revised draft of the circular in light of feedback from a range of key stakeholders, including local government and police force representatives, as to what the guidance should contain. We plan to further engage with interested parties on this revision, with a view to publishing in due course.
Asked by: Debbie Abrahams (Labour - Oldham East and Saddleworth)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, when his Department plans to respond to its consultation entitled, Roads policing review: future methods to improve safety and reduce casualties, which closed on 5 October 2020.
Answered by Richard Holden - Shadow Secretary of State for Transport
The call for evidence to which is referred saw 149 responses submitted, many of which were incredibly detailed. The Government intends to publish the response shortly, once it has given the responses full consideration.
Asked by: Debbie Abrahams (Labour - Oldham East and Saddleworth)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if he will provide an update on the noise camera trials announced in October 2022.
Answered by Richard Holden - Shadow Secretary of State for Transport
Roadside trials of noise camera technology commenced on 18 October 2022 and finished on 1 February 2023. The Department is reviewing the trial outcomes before considering next steps.
Asked by: Debbie Abrahams (Labour - Oldham East and Saddleworth)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what his Department's position is on the use of Project Bank Accounts throughout the supply chain, including for Tier Two and Tier Three contractors, for transport-related construction and infrastructure projects.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson
DfT, including its Arm’s Length Bodies, follow the principles of the Construction Playbook which sets out options to mitigate the risk of potential supplier insolvency, one of these options is the use of Project Bank Accounts.
Asked by: Debbie Abrahams (Labour - Oldham East and Saddleworth)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what discussions he has had with HS2 on the use of Project Bank Accounts throughout their supply chain following the insolvency of HS2 contractor Roadbridge.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson
DfT, including its Arm’s Length Bodies, follow the principles of the Construction Playbook which sets out options to mitigate the risk of potential supplier insolvency, one of these options is the use of Project Bank Accounts.
Asked by: Debbie Abrahams (Labour - Oldham East and Saddleworth)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what information he holds on the use of Project Bank Accounts by (a) his Department, (b) Government agencies his Department has responsibility for and (c) non-departmental bodies his Department has responsibility for.
Answered by Chris Heaton-Harris
Project Bank Accounts are used to ensure fair payment terms on Government construction contracts. As these are specific to construction projects, they are not used by the Department for Transport nor its Agencies. However, the Department’s large non-departmental bodies engaged in construction works do use them to improve cash flow, mitigate risk of payment delay and to reduce the risk of supply chain failure. Use of these provide transparency and assurance over payments to suppliers lower down the supply chain in particular.
Asked by: Debbie Abrahams (Labour - Oldham East and Saddleworth)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what discretion is available to local authorities to grant blue badges to disabled people who are in receipt of the enhanced mobility rate of personal independence payment other than through the moving around criteria; and what steps he has taken to monitor local authorities in their exercise of that discretion.
Answered by Andrew Jones
It is set out in the Disabled Persons (Badges for Motor Vehicles) (England) Regulations 2000 (as amended), that to qualify for a badge via a Personal Independence Payment (PIP) award the applicant must score at least 8 points in the “moving around” activity of the mobility component. There is no discretion for local authorities to issue badges for other PIP awards.
However, where a person fails to qualify for a badge through PIP, they may still apply to their local authority for a badge under the other eligibility criteria; these include any permanent and substantial disabilities (including non-physical disabilities) which cause very considerable difficulty in walking.
Asked by: Debbie Abrahams (Labour - Oldham East and Saddleworth)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if he will commission an impact assessment of the potential effects of the provisions of his Department's Blue Badge Scheme Local Authority Guidance (England), published in October 2014, on people with autism, mental ill health and learning disabilities.
Answered by Andrew Jones
The Department’s Blue Badge Scheme Local Authority Guidance (England) is non-statutory and non-binding. We therefore have no plans to commission an impact assessment. It is the statutory regulations – the Disabled Persons (Badges for Motor Vehicles) (England) Regulations 2000 – which local authorities are obliged to follow.
Asked by: Debbie Abrahams (Labour - Oldham East and Saddleworth)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what estimate he has made of the number of local authorities that charge to issue blue badges to disabled people.
Answered by Andrew Jones
The Disabled Persons (Badges for Motor Vehicles) (England) Regulations 2000 (as amended) permit a local authority to charge up to £10 for the issue of a disabled person's badge. This contributes towards the administration and assessment of the application and the provision of the badge. In return the badge holder receives a package of parking concessions, including free parking in many cases, for up to 3 years. No estimate of the number of local authorities who choose to apply the charge has been made.