Asked by: Catherine West (Labour - Hornsey and Wood Green)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if he will make his policy to reinstate a hard shoulder on all smart motorways.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
On 16 April 2023, the Government announced that all plans for new smart motorways have been cancelled, recognising the lack of confidence felt by drivers and cost pressures. This means no new smart motorways will be built.
We are focused on investing £900m to add further safety improvements to existing smart motorways, including constructing over 150 extra emergency areas – so that people can continue to get around easily and with increased confidence.
Restoring the hard shoulder while maintaining capacity would be hugely disruptive, both for road users and local communities, and come at a significant financial cost, and a potential impact on the overall safety of the road network.
Any reduction in capacity on our Strategic Road Network could put more drivers and passengers at risk of death or serious injury by forcing them on to less safe local roads.
Asked by: Alex Norris (Labour (Co-op) - Nottingham North)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps he is taking to help reduce waiting times for practical driving tests.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency’s (DVSA) main priority is to reduce car practical driving test waiting times, whilst upholding road safety standards.
To increase the number of car driving test slots, the DVSA deployed eligible managers and administrative staff back on the front line to do driving tests from the beginning of October 2023 until the end of March 2024; which created over 145,000 additional test slots. Eligible managers and administrative staff will continue to spend a portion of their time conducting car tests in the coming months to help continue to reduce waiting times.
Measures in place to reduce waiting times for customers, including: the recruitment of driving examiners, conducting tests outside of regular hours, including at weekends and on public holidays, and buying back annual leave from driving examiners is creating, on average, over 48,300 extra car test slots each month.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to the Answer of 18 December 2023 to Question 6880 on Cycling: Pedestrian Areas, whether he plans to develop targeted educational campaigns to improve cyclists' knowledge of pedestrian safety.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Active Travel England is providing £50 million to expand Bikeability cycle training to a million more young people between 2023 and 2025 as part of a projected £3 billion investment in active travel up to 2025. This will help to improve standards of cycling behaviour by teaching young cyclists the rules of the road. In addition, a THINK! Campaign, with significant media investment, supported the changes made to The Highway Code in January 2022. The campaign aimed to raise awareness and understanding of the changes, helping to improve road safety for people walking cycling and horse riding. It included messaging on the hierarchy of road users, making clear that those road users who can do the greatest harm have the greatest responsibility to reduce the danger or threat they may pose to others.
There are no further plans to develop a targeted educational campaign to improve cyclists’ knowledge of pedestrian safety.
Asked by: Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi (Labour - Slough)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to the Answer of 29 February 2024 to Question 15138 on Cycling: Pedestrian Areas, how he plans to support the DVSA in increasing awareness of Rule 64 of the Highway Code among cyclists.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Factual awareness-raising and behaviour change campaigns took place in 2022 and 2023, to highlight the changes the Department made to the Highway Code in January 2022, as part of helping to improve road safety for people walking, cycling, and horse riding.
The campaigns were supported by significant media resource: utilising channels such as radio, digital audio, video on demand, and social media advertising. This approach has helped the Department and DVSA to increase awareness of the relevant Highway Code rules for cycling.
Asked by: Daniel Kawczynski (Conservative - Shrewsbury and Atcham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of introducing graduated driving licences.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
I discussed the issue of graduated driving licences with the MP for Shrewsbury and Atcham and his constituent on 17 April. Since then, the Department for Transport has been considering the Driver 2020 project and further measures the Department can take to improve road safety for young drivers. The Department is still reviewing its position.
Asked by: Michael Shanks (Labour - Rutherglen and Hamilton West)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether he has made an assessment of the level of public awareness of changes to the highway code made in 2022.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The January 2022 changes to The Highway Code to help improve road safety for people walking, cycling and horse riding have been communicated via a factual awareness raising campaign and broader behaviour change campaigns.
Over £2.4million has been spent on media across the campaign, utilising channels such as radio, digital audio, video on demand and social media advertising.
Results from the most recent campaign activity in August 2023 include:
Awareness: The percentage of road users reporting to know either a little or a lot about the Highway Code changes in September 2023 was at 70% among all road users (82% amongst drivers), with 86% of road users having heard of the changes by September 2023.
Understanding: In September 2023 86% of drivers correctly identified that you should leave at least 1.5 metres of space when passing cyclists. Pedestrian priority at junctions was correctly identified by 77% of drivers.
Empathy: Drivers agreeing that it is their responsibility to respect and give space to vulnerable road users remains consistently high and was at 93% in September 2023.
Action: In September 2023 81% of drivers claim to leave a gap of 1.5M when passing a cyclist all or most of the time.
We will continue to promote The Highway Code changes on THINK! and DfT social media channels and via our partner organisations.
Asked by: Jeremy Quin (Conservative - Horsham)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps his Department is taking to improve road safety.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
Although by global standards, roads in the UK are very safe, every road death and injury is a tragedy for the families involved and we are working on a number of measures to keep our roads and road users safe. This Government has updated The Highway Code to improve road safety for people walking, cycling and riding horses, tightened up the law to target the most dangerous drivers and closed the loophole in the offence of driving while using a mobile.
Asked by: Bill Esterson (Labour - Sefton Central)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to the Answer of 27 March 2024 to Question HL3418 on Motorcycles: Licensing, if he will publish an assessment of the potential impact of simplifying the licensing regime for mopeds and motorcycles on road safety.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
I chaired a motorcycle roundtable on 8 May with several key stakeholders from the motorcycle industry and we are working with them to bring together evidence to consider any future measures for licensing.
Asked by: Andrea Jenkyns (Conservative - Morley and Outwood)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps he is taking to help ensure passenger safety in the private hire sector.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
It is the responsibility of local authorities to determine the requirements that must be met by all PHV operators, including Uber, although the Government issues guidance to assist them in carrying out this function.
The Government intends to legislate to enable the setting of national standards for taxi and PHV licensing, enhance licensing authority enforcement powers and establish a national licensing database when parliamentary time allows.
Asked by: Craig Whittaker (Conservative - Calder Valley)
Question to the Department for Transport:
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what progress his Department has made on assessing the Motorcycle Industry Association’s proposal for assessors from approved training bodies to carry out licence upgrades for vehicles up to 22kw.
Answered by Guy Opperman - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)
The Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency is committed to reviewing all aspects of motorcycle training and testing, and is in the process of assessing the Motorcycle Industry Association’s proposals.
Officials met with key representatives of the motorcycle organisations on 4 December 2023 to discuss motorcycle safety. The next round table meeting, which is scheduled for 8 May 2024, will further consider the proposals and options including licence upgrades.