The new class 800 series fleet will allow the operator to reduce the standard London – Edinburgh journey time by 18mins. The East Coast elements of the Intercity Express Programme are predicted to lead to an increase in market share, and an increase in national rail revenue of around £1.1bn (NPV, discounted to 2010, 2010 prices) over the lifetime of the trains.

The franchise competition will consider a range of criteria which will be described in the Invitation to Tender documents. We will consider all bids for affordability and value-for-money as part of this assessment.

If a winning franchisee fails to deliver its commitments there will be a range of contractual mechanisms contained in the Franchise Agreement which may be applied.

Northern Rail driver training and familiarisation has yet to commence. Network Rail’s electrification programme shows that the first service route available for running electric trains will be brought into use by December 2014.

The Department for Transport is currently working together with Northern Rail to develop a plan for the running of the electrified units. This plan will include the timescales for making available a number of electrified units for Northern Rail to be used for driver training and familiarisation.

The Thameslink Rolling Stock Project contracts comprise the supply, finance and subsequent maintenance (including the provision of depots) of the fleet of 1140 carriages. The contracts have an aggregate NPV of approximately £2.6 billion discounted to 2013, and a nominal value of approximately £5.7 billion, in each case to the end of the 20 year commitment period relating to the use of the trains by the Secretary of State for Transport.

The Welsh Government is responsible for funding and managing the Wales and the Borders franchise, operated by Arriva Trains Wales, and this is a matter for the Welsh Government.

The latest estimate of total costs incurred by the Department for Transport at the end of the financial year 2012/13 for the use of consultants in the procurement of the Intercity Express Programme since 2005 is £32.34 million.

Due to changes in the Department’s accounting systems, reliable information to this level of detail is only available for the last four financial years. This data is set out in the table below and includes spending on First Class Partnerships Ltd by Passenger Focus as well as Directly Operated Railways and the Central Department for Transport.

The Secretary of State for Transport confirmed on 27 June 2013 that Siemens Plc with Cross London Trains have been awarded a contract of around £1.6 billion to build 1,140 state-of-the-art carriages for use on the Thameslink rail line.

It has taken longer than first planned because this is a novel and complex contract and it was important to get it right. Achieving the financing for the contract has also taken place against a background of challenging market conditions.

The Department for Transport is working with rail industry partners to ensure sufficient rolling stock to operate newly electrified services has been identified and will be available.

Bidders for the East Coast franchise will be required to enter into arrangements for the use of trains procured through the InterCity Express Programme for use on East Coast in any agreements finalised by Her Majesty's Government.

By December 2014, assuming satisfactory conclusion of the electrification works, it will be possible for Northern Rail to operate electric services between Liverpool and Manchester via Newton-le-Willows and between Liverpool and Wigan via St Helens Central. The Department continues to work with industry partners on the plan for the delivery of rolling stock to utilise the electric infrastructure from this date.

No other electrification projects are due for completion by December 2014.

We have no such plans. The “Crossrail Property Impact Study”, carried out by GVA and published in October 2012, was commissioned by Crossrail Ltd.

The InterCity Express Programme contract includes an option to extend the order to replace the electric Intercity 225 stock. A decision on this is expected to be made in the summer which will inform the rolling stock specification and will be reflected in the Invitation to Tender.

None. Two reports were commissioned by Transport for London to assess the impact of the Jubilee Line extension on land and property values in the proximity of two Underground stations, Southwark and Canary Wharf, using different methodology and data sets:

Land & Property Value Study—Assessing the Change in Land & Property Values Attributable to the Jubilee Line Extension, conducted by Jones Lang LaSalle, published in July 2004, and Property Value Study—Assessing the Change in Values Attributable to the Jubilee Line Extension, conducted by Atisreal and Geofutures, published in May 2005.

The estimated cost of the Jubilee line extension was £3.5 billion. Jones Lang LaSalle’s report concluded that the estimated total uplift in land values around Southwark and Canary Wharf stations between 1992 and 2002 was approximately £2.8 billion, and Atisreal and Geofutures’ report estimated a total property value increase around the stations between 1999 and 2002 of over £2.1 billion.

The specification of rolling stock on the intercity east coast franchise is currently under consideration. It will be for franchise bidders to determine the most appropriate deployment of the available rolling stock to meet the invitation to tender (ITT) requirements.

Freight routeing and network capacity are matters for Network Rail. Network Rail undertakes a programme of market and demand studies in order to understand the likely pattern of developing demand from the freight sector, including ports. It works closely with its customers, including the developers of London Gateway, to determine the extent to which demand can be accommodated within existing capacity or may require capacity enhancements. This process informs the prioritisation of Network Rail’s investment in the strategic rail freight network.

Rolling stock deployment is a matter for the train operators with the Government’s role primarily focused on ensuring that this represents value for money when the taxpayer’s interest is involved. It is therefore for franchise bidders to determine the rolling stock requirements for routes within the franchise area and to work with the rolling stock owning groups to make decisions on investment in both new and existing rolling stock.

The Department for Transport is currently investing in rolling stock for the Thameslink and Inter City Express programmes. These procurements will significantly increase the national fleet size, enabling the department’s investment strategy requirements to be met.

Existing rolling stock procurement programmes (including Thameslink and InterCity Express), and potential cascades of trains to other lines will not be delayed by the franchise schedule announced in March 2013, including during periods of direct awards contracts. The department will be working with both the train operators and rolling stock owning companies to understand any further rolling stock needs identified by them during the direct award periods.

The discount rate applied when calculating the net present value was stated in the invitation to tender for the rolling stock. The rate is 6.35% and is a product of the basic discount rate, considered to be 3.5% and inflation at 2.75%.

The Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation (RTFO) provides additional support to biofuels made from waste (such as used cooking oil) by awarding two renewable transport fuel certificates (RTFCs) for each litre supplied. This means that biofuels made from waste receive double the incentive provided for biofuels made from crops.

The RTFO includes a certificate trading mechanism to increase the efficiency of compliance. The value of individual certificates is determined by the market. Demand and prices will fluctuate during the year for various reasons, including the price of oil.

At a certificate auction in January 2013, the average price was 11p per certificate. We will be reviewing the effect of double certification for biofuels made from waste later in 2013.

Heavy goods vehicles (HGVs) with a maximum gross weight of 44 tonnes on 6 axles were first permitted in Great Britain in 1994, but only when carrying containers for transfer to rail services or for delivery after being conveyed by rail. Such vehicles

were allowed to be used for all purposes from 1 February 2001, before that the maximum limit was 38 tonnes on 5 axles, increased to 40 tonnes on 5 axles in 1999.

Data on the number of heavy goods vehicles licensed in Great Britain, by maximum gross weight, from 1994 to 2011, is published on the Government website at: https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/10567/veh0506.xls.

These data are also shown in the table below. This shows that in 2000, before the general limit was increased to 44 tonnes, a total of 471,500 HGVs were licensed in Great Britain. In 2011 the total number of HGVs licensed was 465,500. Over this period, the number of vehicles over 41 tones has increased from 5,400 to 84,500, while the number of vehicles between 31 tonnes and 41 tonnes has fallen from 105,700 to 48,100.

The current Department for Transport (DfT) trial of longer semi-trailers has always been open to the whole road network in Great Britain, subject to the same height, weight and width restrictions on specific roads, bridges and tunnels that already apply to all road vehicles. Permission to operate up to 1800 longer semi-trailers has been issued to around 170 companies. So far, vehicle special orders for around 430 trailers have been issued to around 60 companies, so we have not yet reached the initial allocation.

A thorough impact assessment was carried out before the trial started and was published on the DfT website in 2011 (http://webarchive.nationalarchives. gov.uk/ 20120607224107/http://www.dft.gov.uk/publications/ia-longer-semi-trailers). This provides extensive information on potential impacts of longer semi-trailers and therefore, the Government have not made any further assessment, pending the findings of the trial.