Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many and what proportion of rail replacement services that take place on vehicles that are compliant with the Persons of Reduced Mobility Technical Specification for Interoperability.

The Government is committed to ensuring that everybody has the same opportunity to use the rail network. According to the data collated by the Office of Rail and Road, for the last 13 rail periods, 38,102 vehicles out of a total of 98,232 (or 38.8%) that were used as rail replacement services were compliant with Public Service Vehicle Accessibility Regulations.

I met with industry on 14 January to discuss this issue and tasked it with producing a robust, achievable plan with a series of milestones and delivery points to show how train operators will move to providing fully compliant rail replacement services. I expect to receive a copy of this plan by the Easter recess.