To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, how many responses his Department has received to the open consultation on the InterCity West Coast rail franchise to date; and if he will make a statement.

The InterCity West Coast franchise is a vitally important franchise for the country. It carries over 34 million passengers every year. We are running a public consultation to enable passengers to have their say on their rail services and want to make sure that passengers’ views are taken into consideration in developing the specification for the future franchise.

The consultation for the next ICWC rail franchise was launched on 10 May 2016, and has been widely publicised through a range of channels including press notices in regional and trade press, posters, leaflets, events, websites, social media and key stakeholder communication channels. I also wrote to all MPs, MSPs and AMs with constituencies on the ICWC route and the Scottish and Welsh Government Transport Secretaries to ensure they were informed of the consultation which serves their parts of the UK. The consultation is ongoing and due to end 2 August.

When the consultation closes, we will review and analyse the information and publish a summary of responses which will include the numbers of consultation responses.