RAIL TRANSPORT ANNOUNCEMENT
The Minister of State for Transport Theresa Villiers has announced the results of the Rail Transport Red Tape Challenge theme. Rail Transport regulations were live in the spotlight between 10 November and 19 December – and received just under 700 comments. The Department for Transport placed 198 regulations online for your views having already identified a further 23 regulations already lapsed. Overall, it is proposed to scrap or improve 40% of these 221, following a vigorous process of challenge.
Plans include:
- harmonising and simplifying the process for obtaining an operating licence by providing a one-stop-shop for applicants, to give more flexibility in how applications are made and reduce duplication by consolidating different regimes;
- streamlining the process for amending penalty fares to give more flexibility and save the industry money by helping to reduce the estimated £180 million lost through fare evasion every year;
- reviewing the railway closure processes to ensure these are fit for purpose and consider deregulatory options;
- removing regulatory burdens and costs on historic cableways by reducing the time and cost associated with formal authorisation processes designed for new installations;
- merging a number of regulations to make them easier to understand; and
- removing a significant number of lapsed or redundant regulations.
The regulatory regime for our railways has traditionally been focussed on ensuring the safe and efficient running of the system rather than imposing regulatory burdens.
Although over fifty per cent of rail regulations are therefore already deregulatory in nature or impose no regulatory burdens or costs, additional potential to deregulate has nevertheless been sought wherever this exists.
These outcomes form part of the wider efforts of Government to improve the railways by reducing micro-management through a franchise reform programme and the proposals in the Department for Transport’s Command Paper “Reforming our Railways: Putting the Customer First”.
Relevant Links
A spreadsheet of the regulations, showing which ones the Government is proposing to change is available here, together with a detailed outcome report here.
The Written Statement from the Minister of State for Transport can be found here.
The closed Rail Transport spotlight can be viewed here.
The DfT Rail Transport web page can be found here.
The DfT Command Paper “Reforming Our Railways: Putting the Customer First” can be found here.
