Govia Thameslink Railway: Finance

Department for Transport written question – answered at on 15 September 2016.

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Photo of Crispin Blunt Crispin Blunt Chair, Foreign Affairs Committee, Chair, Foreign Affairs Committee

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what (a) has been and (b) is the projected balance between the fee paid to Govia Thameslink Railway for delivering the current franchise and the income from fares for each financial year of the franchise period.

Photo of Paul Maynard Paul Maynard Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Transport)

As was stated when the franchise was awarded to Govia Thameslink Railway, the Thameslink Southern and Great Northern franchise is let as a management contract, where ticket revenues are passed directly to the Government rather than retained by Govia. This means that this franchise does not have premium/ subsidy payments.

In respect of part (a) Prior year figures are published by the ORR: http://orr.gov.uk/statistics/published-stats/gb-rail-industry-financial-information

In relation to part (b), in February 2015 a Franchise Payment Profile was deposited in the Library of the house; this contained the following information with regard to Govia Thameslink Railway:

Franchises - current as at 25 Feb 2015

Franchise Payment profile to 2023 (in NOMINAL £)

Caveats

All figures are based on current franchise agreements including the current estimates for Control Period 5 and fares policy adjustments. The figures do not include revenue support, revenue share, profit share, or adjustments for GDP.

All figures are subject to change in the future as a result of negotiated contractual changes and changes to inflation indices above or below that assumed.

2015/16

2016/17

2017/18

2018/19

2019/20

2020/21

2021/22

275,405,206

403,760,328

424,690,456

404,131,348

497,212,369

587,111,514

303,608,193

These figures represent the net balance between payments made under the Management Contract and revenue received, and indicate a payment from the Train Operating Company to the department.

The moneys paid to the Department by the Train Operator contribute to the overall budget for the provision of passenger rail services.

This Government is committed to continuing to invest in passenger rail and, for example, we are investing more than £1.6billion of taxpayers’ money in new, longer, and more spacious Thameslink trains. We have also recently announced a targeted £20m fund, to be spent by Network Rail under project board authority, to help get Southern rail services back running as they should.

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