Oral Answers to Questions

Tommy Sheppard Excerpts

Thursday 10th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Ms Ghani]

I am a little confused by the hon. Gentleman’s statement, because the Government are yet to put out our response. We are working with the charities sector, including with the Community Transport Association and community transport operators. There is an EU regulation that we are trying to make this fit into, but we are committed to ensuring that our community transport operators continue to operate. That is why we have the £3 million fund and the £11.5 million building connections fund.

[Tommy Sheppard (Edinburgh East) (SNP)]

4. What steps he is taking to reduce potential disruption to travel at UK ports in the event of the UK leaving the EU without a deal.

[Martyn Day (Linlithgow and East Falkirk) (SNP)]

9. What steps he is taking to reduce potential disruption to travel at UK ports in the event of the UK leaving the EU without a deal.

[The Secretary of State for Transport (Chris Grayling)]

The Department has been working for some time to ensure that traffic can continue to flow through UK ports as frictionlessly as possible in all scenarios when we leave the European Union. This has included engaging closely with others across Government, and with ports and their representative bodies. As regards ferry capacity, I refer the House to the two statements I made earlier this week.

[Tommy Sheppard]

The Government will forgive the House some scepticism about their efficacy and intention in this regard. Surely the Seaborne fiasco shows that only one of two things can be happening: either there is abject incompetence in the preparations for no deal; or the Secretary of State and his Department are not really taking them seriously. Which is it?