Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how much of the £300 million in funding announced in the Autumn Budget and Spending Review 2021 for the extension of the Clean Maritime Demonstration Competition and HGV technology trials will be made available specifically to the maritime sector.
Answered by Robert Courts
DfT received £300m for R&D initiatives to help commercialise low and zero emission technologies. The Department will shortly commence a prioritisation process to allocate this funding across different programmes, including maritime. The outcome will be shared in due course.
Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps he is taking to help support the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency to address the driving test backlog.
Answered by Trudy Harrison
The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) has put in place a number of measures to increase practical driving tests. These include offering overtime and annual leave buy back to examiners, asking all those qualified to conduct tests, but who do not do so as part of their current day job, to return to conducting tests, and conducting out of hours testing (such as on public holidays). The DVSA has also started a recruitment campaign to increase the number of examiners.
Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps he (a) has taken and (b) plans to take so that the Office of Low Emission Vehicles Grant is potentially accessible for the maximum number of applicants.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
The Office for Zero Emissions Vehicles (OZEV) administers several grant funding schemes to assist with the up-front cost of purchasing zero emission vehicles, and the associated recharging infrastructure. The government keeps all of these schemes under review and aims to ensure they represent value for money for tax payers Phasing out the sale of new petrol and diesel cars and vans by 2030 will put the UK on course to be the G7 country that will decarbonise cars and vans fastest. Doing this will help us meet our climate change obligations, improve air quality, support economic growth and put us at the forefront of the electric vehicle revolution with vehicles built right here in the UK. The Plug-in Car Grant focuses grant funding on more affordable zero emission vehicles priced under £35k where most consumers will be looking and where public money will make more of a difference. The Government has pledged £582 million in grants for those purchasing zero or ultra-low emission vehicles to make them cheaper to buy and incentivise more people to make the transition. The March 2020 Budget confirmed that users of zero emission cars will continue to benefit from favourable company car tax rates until 2025 (1% of list price in 2021/22 and 2% in 2022/23 though to 2024/25).
Additionally, all zero emission cars are exempt from vehicle excise duty (VED). Reforms to our home and workplace charging grants will focus support on those that need it most, including those living in flats, rental and leasehold accommodation, SMEs and charities.
Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what risk assessment his Department has made of the potential effect of removing the legal requirement to wear face coverings on public transport during the covid-19 outbreak; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
Since 19 July, whilst many of the legal restrictions that the Government has imposed through the pandemic have been lifted, guidance will remain, making it clear this is not yet a return to normal. The Government expects and recommends that people wear face coverings in crowded areas such as public transport. By practising key behaviours, people can continue to protect themselves and others. Employees and customers who wish to wear a face covering should be supported to do so. If transport operators wish to set their own policy on face coverings, that is a matter for them to consider, as long as they meet existing legal obligations including under equalities law.
Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment has he made of the waiting times for HGV driving licence tests; and whether he has plans to take steps to reduce them.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
The suspension of routine vocational testing as a result of the pandemic has created an inevitable backlog. The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) is doing all it can to increase the number of vocational tests available and has put in place a number of measures to do this.
These include offering overtime and annual leave buy back to examiners, asking all those qualified to conduct tests, but who do not do so as part of their current day job, to return to conducting tests, and conducting out of hours testing (such as on public holidays and weekends). This has increased the overall number of vocational test slots made available to around 3,000 per week.
The DVSA will be launching a recruitment campaign to increase the number of HGV examiners. It will also continue its training programme to enable more examiners to conduct vocational tests.
Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of the potential benefits of allowing Class 3 mobility scooters to be used in cycle lanes.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
Mobility scooters can be used on footways, footpaths, bridleways or pedestrianised areas, provided that they are used in accordance with prescribed requirements. Larger mobility scooters, capable of going up to 8mph, are permitted to use the road. The Government does not have any current plans to review and update the places where mobility scooters are permitted to be used.
Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether he has published guidance to local authorities on the issuing of a conditional offer of fixed penalty where covid-19 restrictions have impacted a person's ability to follow parking laws.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
The Department has published a wide range of guidance to local authorities in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. While no specific guidance on this matter has been published, other published guidance, including updated Network Management Duty statutory guidance, has encouraged local authorities to consider the wider impact to their network when implementing changes.
Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of the effect of HGV driver shortages on (a) the road haulage industry and (b) the timely supply of goods and food; and pursuant to the Answer of 18 June 2021 to Question 13206 on Visas: Large Goods Vehicle Drivers, what plans his Department has to promote jobs, training, and other initiatives to get more people into HGV driving.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
The Department has held regular meetings with the road haulage industry regarding driver shortages and its impact on supply chains, including a roundtable with ministers.
We are supporting the development of apprenticeships, including a standard to train lorry drivers. A revised standard will be available in August attracting £7,000 in apprenticeship levy funding.
The Department for Work and Pensions is developing a scheme to train jobseekers in HGV driving. The Flexible Support Fund is available to help the unemployed or those in receipt of Universal Credit renew their Driver Certificate of Professional Competence (CPC).
The Department has provided a grant for the non-profit initiative Road to Logistics to train military service leavers, ex-offenders and the long term unemployed to move into jobs in the logistics sector, including lorry driving.
Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department are taking to ensure availability of electric vehicle charging facilities across England.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
We are investing an additional £1.3 billion to accelerate the roll out of electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure across the UK. Today, a driver is never more than 25 miles away from a rapid chargepoint anywhere along England’s motorways and major A roads. The new Rapid Charging Fund will fund new and upgraded electricity connections at motorway and major A road services to support the installation of thousands of new rapid chargers on England’s major roads. By 2023, we aim to have at least six high powered, open access chargepoints at every motorway service area in England, with some larger sites having as many as 10-12. By 2035 we expect the number to increase to around 6,000 high powers chargers across the network. Government is also providing funding to support the installation of chargepoint infrastructure in local communities, at homes, workplaces and residential streets, accelerating the market to provide the infrastructure that is needed to support 100% uptake of zero emission vehicles ahead of need. This year we will publish an infrastructure charging strategy and provisions for chargepoints to be installed in new homes, where appropriate, in England.
Asked by: Emma Hardy (Labour - Kingston upon Hull West and Haltemprice)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to the Answer of 25 March 2021 to Question 173157, how his Department collected the views of people with protected characteristics, such as blind and partially sighted people as part of the recent pavement parking consultation, which closed on 22 November 2020.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
The Department is analysing the high volume of responses to ensure that all views are captured, and Ministers will be carefully considering the consultation findings before deciding the way forward.
We will publish a response to the consultation in due course and it will be available to view at: www.gov.uk/government/consultations/managing-pavement-parking.
During the consultation, the majority of Departmental staff were working from home to help control the spread of COVID-19. We therefore sought to encourage all replies to the consultation by online survey or by email where this was an easier solution. We worked with disability groups including RNIB on accessibility issues and, in addition, to the online survey, we provided an ‘Easy Read’ version, a fully interactive ‘Large Print’ response form, as well as an audio file. We sincerely hope that the majority of people wishing to respond did have access to the internet, such as from a library or with help from friends or family.