Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps she is taking to strengthen retrospective rural-proofing of her Department's policies.

The Department keeps the impact of its policies on rural communities up and down the country under continual review and has strengthened retrospective rural-proofing in three ways.

Firstly our Transport Appraisal framework is rigorous and provides structured guidance during the appraisal process. It ensures that local context is effectively captured and that place-based analysis is appropriately conducted, including within rural communities.

Secondly, the Department consistently considers the distributional impacts of its policies through the application of equalities impact assessments. These assessments include a thorough review of potential differential impacts on communities including rural communities, ensuring that Ministers are fully informed when making policy decisions.

Thirdly, we are commissioning and publishing independent evaluations of programmes with significant rural reach- such as Demand Responsive Transport pilots funded through the Rural Mobility Fund and the Tackling Loneliness with Transport pilots - and will publish further evaluation outputs in the coming months to inform future policy and guidance.