Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what estimate he has made of the amount of additional rail capacity which will be available at the end of Network Rail’s Control Period 7 funding settlement between 2024 and 2029.

The Secretary of State was clear in the 2022 High-Level Output Specification that he expects to see an efficient approach to system operation in Control Period 7 (CP7), underpinning allocation of capacity that best supports reliability, informed timetable specification and effective use of the network for rail freight—bolstered by the continued adoption of digital signalling.

Network Rail plans to support passenger train growth on major routes in the next Control Period, expected to be around 1% to 5% by the end of CP7. Across the whole network, operators will continue to be obliged to release any unused capacity to ensure that it can be appropriately allocated.

Network Rail plans support a further 25 rail freight trains per day in CP7, in pursuit of growing rail freight by 7.5% during Control Period 7. The independent regulator, the Office of Rail and Road, will hold Network Rail to account against this growth target.

We continue to support ambitious rail infrastructure upgrades (“enhancements”) across the country which will increase capacity across the rail network. Rail enhancements are funded and managed separately from the Control Period settlements.