PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
Railways: Franchises (4 November 2014)

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, pursuant to the Answer of 4 November 2014 to Question 212594, what the cost has been of each (a) direct award and (b) franchise extension since September 2012.

Asked by:
Lilian Greenwood (Labour)

The costs of negotiating the Direct Awards and Franchise Extensions since September 2012 are shown in the table below. Except where noted, figures include staff costs, advisers and “non-pay” administrative costs (for example, IT facilities, training and travel expenses). All figures include VAT.

Franchise	Cost (£K)	Comments
West Coast (2012)	10	See Note 1 below
C2C	450	Estimated adviser costs – staff costs and “non-pay” not included – see Note 2 below
First Capital Connect	424	Staff costs and “non-pay” not included – see Note 2 below
Great Western (First Direct Award)	200	Estimated adviser costs – staff costs and “non-pay” not included – see Note 2 below
Northern	1,536
Greater Anglia	1,088
West Coast (2014)	842
Southeastern	918

Note 1: The bulk of the costs relating to the 2012 West Coast franchise extension were charged to the re-franchising project and have not been scored separately.

Note 2: The initial Direct Awards (C2C, First Capital Connect and Great Western First Direct Award) were negotiated using resources redirected from elsewhere in the Department. We therefore have limited specific information relating to the costs of negotiating these deals.

Answered by:
Claire Perry (Conservative)
7 November 2014