Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, (a) for how many (i) individuals and (ii) nights was accommodation purchased at the Bonaventure Hotel, Montreal, for staff attending the 41st Session of the International Civil Aviation Organization, and (b) what total payments were made to the Bonaventure Hotel for (i) that accommodation, and (ii) other costs associated with attendance at the event, including the provision of meeting rooms, equipment and refreshments.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
With reference to two payments published in relation to spend in September 2022 for the Bonaventure Hotel. The payments were relating to costs associated with a meeting of the International Aviation Climate Ambition Coalition (IACAC). The first cost of £1,635.04 was a deposit for the hire of the venue and the second cost of £7,773.23 was the final balance which included the provision of meeting rooms, equipment, and refreshments. The venue was booked for 150 attendees and accommodation was purchased separately.
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to his Department’s publication of government procurement card spending over £500 for November 2021, for which team were Signal CX, providers of Service Animals training courses, paid £2,850 on 23 November 2021 to organise an away day; how many individuals took part in that away day; and for what purpose it was required.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
The Department for Transport has budget for procurement of training by senior managers in line with agreed business objectives. In June 2021, the Local Transport Directorate carried out a re-organisation of the directorate. To support teams work better and build leadership and service delivery skills, the Senior Leadership Team and their direct reports (29 individuals in total) partook in a 1.5 days workshop. This was delivered virtually and facilitated by an external service provider SignalCX. The team building exercise to improve team dynamics was based on ‘service animals’ which is a profiling and training tool.
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to his Department’s publication of Government procurement card spending over £500 for November 2021, for which team were Signal CX paid £2,850 on 23 November 2021 to organise an away day; how many individuals took part; in which location the event was held; and for what purpose the awayday was arranged.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
The Department for Transport has budget for procurement of training by senior managers in line with agreed business objectives. In June 2021, the Local Transport Directorate carried out a re-organisation of the directorate. To support teams work better and build leadership and service delivery skills, the Senior Leadership Team and their direct reports (29 individuals in total) partook in a 1.5 days workshop. This was delivered virtually and facilitated by an external service provider SignalCX. The team building exercise to improve team dynamics was based on ‘service animals’ which is a profiling and training tool.
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to his Department’s Greening Government Commitments for 2021-25, how many tonnes of food waste were produced from his Departmental estate in the financial year (a) 2021-22 and (b) 2022-23 up to 31 December 2022.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
Please find below a table stating how much food waste was produced across DfT:
2021/22 | 9.74 tonnes of food waste |
2022/23 | 6.00 tonnes of food waste (up to 30/9/22 as Q3 data is not available until end of January 2023) |
The relative increase in 2022/23 to date is attributed to the increase in office attendance during that period.
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to his Department’s publication of government procurement card spending over £500 for May 2021, which hotel was used by the seven staff from his Department attending the 2021 Information and Records Management Society Conference; and whether the costs of that accommodation were included in the £5,451.60 paid by his Department to Revolution Events Ltd. on 27 May 2021.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
The payment to Revolution Events Ltd on 27 May 2021 was for attendance at the Information and Records Management Society Conference 2022. This was held at DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel, Glasgow Central. The seven staff who attended stayed in the conference hotel for the duration of the conference, and costs of accommodation, lunch and refreshments were included in the sum paid.
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference his Department’s publication of Government procurement card spending over £500 for August 2021, whether the two identical entries for spending at The Plaza Tirana on 26 August 2021 represent two separate items of expenditure totalling £1,047.50 or duplicates of the same item of expenditure worth £523.75.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
The two entries represent two separate items of expenditure. They are for two separate hotel rooms of the same price, which were booked separately for the two individuals attending the meeting in Tirana in August 2021. The items were authorised and relate to stays by delegates in the conference hotel.
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to his Department’s publication of spending over £500 with a Government procurement card in August 2021, for how many (a) individuals and (b) nights accommodation was purchased at The Plaza Tirana on 26 August 2021; and what the purpose was for that stay at that hotel.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
The purpose of the visit was for the UK Director General for Civil Aviation and another senior member of the DFT International Aviation team to attend the 70th Special Meeting of European Civil Aviation Conference Directors General of Civil Aviation. They stayed for three nights in the designated conference hotel, in line with normal practice.
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to his Department’s publication of government procurement card spending over £500 for November 2021, for which team were Mind Gym paid £5,400 on 15 November 2021 to facilitate an away day; how many individuals took part; in which location was it held; and for what purpose was it required.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
The Department for Transport has a budget for the procurement of training by senior managers in line with agreed business objectives. This training was delivered at the Kia Oval by MindGym to approximately 90 individuals from the Transport Security, Resilience and Response Directorate to build and improve resilience.
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to his Department’s publication of government procurement card spending over £500 for December 2021, what was the (a) nature and (b) purpose of the training event for which a speaker was hired from UK Champions PLC on 3 December 2021; what was the name of the speaker who appeared at that event; and for how long and on what topic that speaker spoke.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
The event was for the Department for Transport’s Aviation Directorate to come together as a team after Covid restrictions on office working. The speaker was from UK Champions PLC and spoke for 45 minutes about her career and experience as one of the highest-ranking female officers in the armed forces; and about the importance of inclusive leadership, teamwork and retention of diverse talent in challenging times.
Asked by: Emily Thornberry (Labour - Islington South and Finsbury)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to the Answer of 19 December 2022 to Question 107064, how many purchases with a value less than £500 were made against his Department’s budget through a Government procurement card in 2021.
Answered by Jesse Norman - Shadow Leader of the House of Commons
The Department made 9,942 transactions in 2021 on purchasing goods and services with a value of less than £500 on a government procurement card. The majority of these transactions (7,387) were for payments of less than £50.