Asked by: Joe Morris (Labour - Hexham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what discussions the Department is having with relevant stakeholders on improving local bus services in Northumberland.
Answered by Simon Lightwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Government is committed to helping local leaders improve local bus services and grow usage across England, including the North East, Northumberland and Hexham constituency. The Department for Transport regularly engages with local authority representatives from the North East Combined Authority, including as part of our continued support to local transport authorities pursuing bus franchising.
We are taking action to give local leaders the powers they need to deliver better bus services for passengers, including through the Bus Services Act 2025, and investing over £1 billion in 2025/26 to support and improve bus services in England outside London, of which £23.8 million has been allocated to the North East Combined Authority. This funding can be used to expand services and improve reliability, which are currently massive obstacles for too many people.
Asked by: Joe Morris (Labour - Hexham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what discussions the Department is having with relevant stakeholders on improving local bus services in the Hexham constituency.
Answered by Simon Lightwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Government is committed to helping local leaders improve local bus services and grow usage across England, including the North East, Northumberland and Hexham constituency. The Department for Transport regularly engages with local authority representatives from the North East Combined Authority, including as part of our continued support to local transport authorities pursuing bus franchising.
We are taking action to give local leaders the powers they need to deliver better bus services for passengers, including through the Bus Services Act 2025, and investing over £1 billion in 2025/26 to support and improve bus services in England outside London, of which £23.8 million has been allocated to the North East Combined Authority. This funding can be used to expand services and improve reliability, which are currently massive obstacles for too many people.
Asked by: Joe Morris (Labour - Hexham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what conversations the Department is having with relevant stakeholders to improve local bus services in the North East.
Answered by Simon Lightwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Government is committed to helping local leaders improve local bus services and grow usage across England, including the North East, Northumberland and Hexham constituency. The Department for Transport regularly engages with local authority representatives from the North East Combined Authority, including as part of our continued support to local transport authorities pursuing bus franchising.
We are taking action to give local leaders the powers they need to deliver better bus services for passengers, including through the Bus Services Act 2025, and investing over £1 billion in 2025/26 to support and improve bus services in England outside London, of which £23.8 million has been allocated to the North East Combined Authority. This funding can be used to expand services and improve reliability, which are currently massive obstacles for too many people.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton West)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what plans she has to expand EV charging infrastructure in underserved regions.
Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Government is committed to accelerating the roll-out of affordable and accessible charging infrastructure so that everyone, no matter where they live or work, can make the transition to an electric vehicle (EV). As of 1 November 2025, Government and industry have supported the installation of 86,798 publicly available charging devices, up 22% on this time last year. In 2024, the number of publicly available charging devices in rural areas of England increased by 45%.
Government’s £381m Local EV Infrastructure (LEVI) Fund allocated capital and resource funding across England. Funding allocations were determined through an assessment of local authority need, including deprivation levels and rurality. The North East region was allocated over £25m LEVI funding to leverage significant private investment and expand the number of local public chargepoints across the region.
The £25 million EV Pavement Channel Grant is also available, which is intended to empower local authorities to adopt pavement channels as part of their local charging solutions. The North East was allocated over £1.6m to support the installation of pavement channels alongside public chargepoints.
Asked by: Jim McMahon (Labour (Co-op) - Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many vehicles (a) are taxed, (b) have Statutory Off Road Notifications, (c) are untaxed and (d) are undeclared as having Statutory Off Road Notifications by nation and region.
Answered by Simon Lightwood - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The information requested is shown in the table below. Please note the table includes vehicles for which there is a current registered keeper on record and where a postcode match was found:
England regions | Taxed vehicles | Vehicles for which a SORN has been made |
East Midlands | 3,230,522 | 520,712 |
East of England | 4,352,181 | 668,578 |
London | 3,008,654 | 429,872 |
North East | 1,509,315 | 207,761 |
North West | 4,503,390 | 549,655 |
South East | 6,883,503 | 826,967 |
South West | 4,353,614 | 641,457 |
West Midlands | 3,667,490 | 609,163 |
Yorkshire & The Humber | 3,335,460 | 479,448 |
Total for England | 34,844,129 | 4,933,613 |
| Wales | Scotland | Northern Ireland |
Taxed vehicles | 2,086,861 | 3,218,548 | 1,306,521 |
Vehicles for which a SORN has been made | 410,187 | 505,357 | 357,610 |
The most recent information available shows that 98.7 per cent of vehicles across the UK were properly licensed. More detail can be found at the following link: gov.uk/government/statistics/vehicle-excise-duty-evasion-statistics-2023
Information is not available about vehicles which are being kept off the road but for which no SORN is in place.
Asked by: David Chadwick (Liberal Democrat - Brecon, Radnor and Cwm Tawe)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what formal representation (a) Welsh Ministers and (b) Transport for Wales will have in the governance structure of Great British Railways.
Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
There will be a statutory requirement for Welsh Ministers and the Secretary of State to agree a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU).
The contents of this MoU have been outlined in Written Ministerial Statements by the Secretary of State for Transport in the UK Parliament and Ken Skates, Cabinet Secretary for Transport and North Wales, in the Senedd, accompanying the Railways Bill. These statements reinforce our commitment to collaborative governance, outlining shared ministerial intentions across areas such as track and train integration, cross-border service oversight, and the establishment of a dedicated GBR Wales and Borders Business Unit.
The final MoU will be published in due course as committed to within the Bill.
Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to her Department's press release entitled Cutting-edge rail ticket technology to be trialled across the Midlands and North, published on 1 September 2025, for what reason nationalised all rail services are not involved in the trial.
Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Trial locations were primarily selected based on them not having existing or planned Pay as You Go schemes, there being a significant commuter demographic, and where existing fares structures supported trial delivery. As a result, the lead operators are East Midlands Railway and Northern, supported by Cross Country and LNER as needed.
Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to the press release entitled Cutting-edge rail ticket technology to be trialled across the Midlands and North, published on 1 September 2025, for what reason East Midlands Rail and Northern were selected for that trial.
Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The routes in the East Midlands and Yorkshire operated by East Midlands Railway and Northern were selected as being areas of the rail network that do not have existing or planned Pay-As-You-Go schemes and with large enough passenger numbers to give statistically significant results, a significant commuter demographic, and where existing fares structures supported trial delivery.
Asked by: Blake Stephenson (Conservative - Mid Bedfordshire)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, with reference to the press release entitled Cutting-edge rail ticket technology to be trialled across the Midlands and North, published on 1 September 2025, how she plans to measure the success of that trial.
Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
An independent evaluation of the Digital Pay-As-You-Go trials, including the one on East Midlands Railway between Leicester, Derby and Nottingham, has been commissioned. The trial is currently expected to end in 2027, and we intend to publish the findings in due course.
Asked by: Joe Morris (Labour - Hexham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what discussions her Department has had with relevant stakeholders on improving step- free access for train stations in the North East.
Answered by Keir Mather - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Department continues to work closely with Network Rail, train operators and local authorities to improve step-free access at stations across the North East.
For example, the Transpennine Route Upgrade will provide step free access at 22 stations. A number of stations in the region have been made accessible with funding from the Access for All programme, including Northallerton and Middlesborough railway stations.