§ Mr. Bradleyasked the Secretary of State for Transport what progress has been made in arrangements for setting targets for the different sectors of the rail passenger business.
§ Mr. William RodgersThe Government have already published, in their776W response to the First Report from the SCNI Session 1976–77 (Cmnd. 7038), a breakdown of the budgeted contributions for each sector based on estimates for 1977, and the British Railways Board's annual report for 1977 has since given estimated outturn figures for 1977. The budgeted figures for 1978 have been given to the House, and were in the Board's report. This practice will be continued so that the House and the public will be able to see, each year, the contributions which each sector of the railway business can make, based on the budget for the year and the grant claim which I have accepted, and the outturn achieved.
Arrangements have now been worked out with the Board for this year's corporate plan, when it is submitted to me, to set out forecast sector contributions as a basis on which the Board seeks my approval for its plans under section 4(2) of the Railways Act 1974. Any public statement which it will be appropriate for me to make at that time will conform with the new arrangements described in the White Paper "The Nationalised Industries" (Cmnd. 7131).