Tag: Jonathan Reynolds

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Reynolds on 2016-01-05.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to the Answers of 16 December 2015 to Questions 19325 and 19326, how many staff in his Department were employed on a contract basis to procure the (a) Northern and (b) TransPennine franchise agreements; and what the total cost to the public purse was of those staff.

Andrew Jones

The Department employed six individuals as contract staff at various times (sometimes covering the same role consecutively) for the Northern competition, and five for the TransPennine Competition. Costs of those staff were £1.203M and £1.275M respectively.

These costs however need to be set against the context of the deals achieved, whereby for Northern the amount of annual subsidy will be reduced by £160million by the end of the 9-year contract and for TransPennine the Government will receive £400million in premiums over the life of the franchise, compared to the previous situation where the franchise was subsidised.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Reynolds on 2016-03-02.

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what assessment her Department has made of the potential effect on consumer energy bills of bringing forward by one year the start of the Capacity Market.

Andrea Leadsom

The Capacity Market is designed to encourage competition and a low clearing price. It is technology neutral and will procure any type of capacity to meet the target at the lowest possible cost to consumers. By keeping more plant in the market, it is also likely to increase competition and drive down costs. The Capacity Market will protect consumers from higher cost spikes that would occur if our electricity supplies were less secure.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Reynolds on 2016-05-19.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many people are currently being treated in Assessment and Treatment Units.

Alistair Burt

At the end of April 2016 for inpatients with a learning disability and/or autism, the average length of stay was 1,095 days. The total number of inpatients was 2,565. 415 were diagnosed with autism only and 555 patients had a learning disability and autism (Learning Disability Services Monthly Statistics, April 2016).

The average weekly cost for inpatient care was £3,563 per week in September 2015 (Learning Disability Census: England 2015)

Both the Learning Disability Services Monthly Statistics and the Learning Disability Census provide data on people with learning disabilities and/or autism spectrum disorder receiving inpatient care commissioned in England.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Reynolds on 2015-10-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, when he plans for the electrification of the Great Western Mainline to be completed.

Claire Perry

The Secretary of State announced in June that Sir Peter Hendy, the new Chair of Network Rail, would develop proposals for how the rail upgrade programme, including the Great Western Mainline, will be carried out. He will report to the Secretary of State later in the autumn and it would be premature to speculate on his conclusions.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Reynolds on 2015-10-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how much has been spent by his Department on franchising negotiations since 2010.

Claire Perry

Since 2013, and the setting up of Rail Executive Passenger Services, the Department has separated out the cost of individual Franchise Competitions and Direct Awards. Prior to 2013 such costs are merged within the general costs of running the franchised passenger services and we are unable to disaggregate them from the general costs.

The cost of re-franchising projects since the re-launch of the Franchising Programme in Spring 2013 is £41.4 million. This represents the actual consultancy and non-pay staff costs for the duration of the completed competitions and Direct Awards. This figure includes costs for ongoing competitions and Direct Awards up to and including the end of September.

Franchise competitions are not the result of negotiation, but of open competition. The benefits these competitions bring to the passenger far outweigh the cost to the Department. I also note that the franchising system returned £1.15billion to the taxpayer in financial years 2014/15, and is expected to return a similar amount in 2015/16.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Reynolds on 2015-10-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many complaints by passengers were received by Network Rail in (a) 2010, (b) 2011, (c) 2012, (d) 2013, (e) 2014 and (f) 2015.

Claire Perry

Network Rail was reclassified as an arm’s-length public sector body on 1 September 2014 and the collation of statistics of annual complaints received remains an operational matter for the company.

Network Rail advises that its customer relationship management system focusses on providing solutions to a range of customer service requests, the majority of which are received from line-side residents rather than passengers. Network Rail’s system does not focus specifically on logging the annual number of passenger complaints.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Reynolds on 2015-10-22.

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, when he plans for the South East Flexible Ticketing scheme to be delivered.

Claire Perry

Smart ticketing was taken forward by the Coalition Government after 2010. Five train operators, serving 73% of all rail season ticket holders in the South East, have now signed up to the South East Flexible Ticketing (SEFT) programme.

Smart season tickets are already available to customers on Govia Thameslink Railway and c2c. South West Trains and Abellio Greater Anglia plan to introduce smart seasons on their services in January 2016; Southeastern will follow at the end of 2016.

A new SEFT central back office, providing critical IT infrastructure and data processing capability, underwent testing in August 2015. This will enable train operators to consider a range of new products and services including automatic delay repay, flexible season tickets and loyalty schemes, and also to extend smart ticketing across a range of transport modes including rail, trams and buses.

In September 2015, Birmingham New Street station reopened with smart-enabled ticket barriers supported by the central back office.

On current plans, the South East Flexible Ticketing programme will complete in 2018.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Reynolds on 2015-10-27.

To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland, what discussions he has had with (a) Ministers of the Scottish Government and (b) his Cabinet colleagues on reducing the voting age to 16 for all Scottish and UK elections.

David Mundell

The Scottish Parliament passed an Act to lower the voting age in those elections in June 2015.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Reynolds on 2015-02-10.

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, if he will take steps to limit the amount energy suppliers can charge consumers for the introduction of smart meters.

Amber Rudd

The Government has introduced regulation to ensure that there will be no upfront charges to consumers for the introduction of smart meters.

The Government’s approach to minimising costs and ensuring cost savings from smart metering are passed on to consumers is embedded in the strategy of mandating an energy supplier-led roll out. As commercial entities competing for customers, energy suppliers are incentivised to minimise costs and maximise cost savings. Where suppliers do not keep their customer offer and prices competitive, customers will be able to switch to a new energy supplier.

The Government and Ofgem are committed to further enhancing retail energy competition. To this end, Ofgem has referred the retail energy market to the Competition and Markets Authority to investigate if features of the market are having an adverse effect on competition and, if so, what reforms would make competition even more effective.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jonathan Reynolds on 2015-02-12.

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what information energy suppliers are required to provide (a) his Department and (b) Ofgem to assist with monitoring the roll-out of smart meters to vulnerable, low income and pre-payment meter customers.

Amber Rudd

On an annual basis larger suppliers are required to provide the Department with a qualitative report on their roll-out strategies, including plans to engage with vulnerable and pre-payment customers. Smaller suppliers are also required to provide annual data on their plans for engaging vulnerable customers. Low income households are not defined as a separate category.

The Department also collects quarterly data from larger energy suppliers which includes details of smart meters installed and operated in pre-payment mode, and details of their plans for installing smart meters, including where those meters will be operated in pre-payment mode. The same information is collected annually from small suppliers.

Ofgem collects data from the larger suppliers on the number of pre-payment meters that have been replaced with smart meters, and from January 2016 suppliers will report on the number of customers on the Priority Services Register who have a smart meter installed. This data will be collected annually. The larger suppliers will also shortly be submitting qualitative roll-out plans to Ofgem, explaining how they plan to develop their IT systems to support the rollout of smart pre-payment.

Separately, Ofgem is reviewing suppliers’ policies and practices relating to charges for installing and removing pre-payment meters, which will also cover aspects of smart meter services. The review will also look at company practices in relation to security deposits, including for customers with smart meters. Ofgem will report on its findings in summer 2015.