Executive Agencies (Hansard, 28 April 1995)

§ Mr. Norris

The following key targets have been set for the Department of Transport's executive agencies. The targets are set out in the agencies' business plans, which also include management objectives, performance indicators and key tasks, where appropriate to the agencies' businesses. Copies of the business plans will be placed in the Library in due course except that for the Transport Research Laboratory, whose plan is commercially confidential and will not be published.

The key targets for the Coastguard Agency are to: discharge the Secretary of State's responsibility for maritime search and rescue through the agency's own or dedicated assets by:

(i) maintaining a 24 hours SAR co-ordinating capability within, and including the coasts and shoreline of, the United Kingdom search and rescue region, UKSRR;
(ii) maintaining a comprehensive radio reception and transmission coverage of the UKSRR which enables SAR co-ordination action for the duration of incidents without interruption or equipment malfunction; and
(iii) testing contingency plans for major maritime SAR incidents, particularly those involving ferries, by undertaking six major live exercises;

review the recording of SAR incidents, by October 1995; and after consideration of the pattern and type of incidents to make proposals for improving the effectiveness of the current SAR prevention strategy by March 1996; maintain a fully operational 24-hour channel navigation information service covering the Dover strait traffic separation scheme, in concert with the appropriate French authorities; 766W discharge the Secretary of State's responsibility for dealing with marine pollution by the maintenance of a national contingency plan and in particular:

(i) activate the plan within 30 minutes of notification of an incident;
(ii) commence action at sea to deal with a spill of dispersable oil within four hours of notification of an incident;
(iii) test the effectiveness of the plan by undertaking a major exercise and to report on the outcome by 31 March 1996;

carry out 625 hours a year aerial surveillance of the sea area for which the UK has responsibility to detect or deter incidents of marine pollution, including illegal discharges from ships; deliver the key targets and key tasks in the business plan within the agreed running costs budget.

The key targets for the Driving Standards Agency are to: achieve unit costs of £24.75 for car tests; £56.00 for vocational tests; £33.40 for motorcycle tests; and £40.80 for the activities associated with the register of approved driving instructors; achieve a national average waiting time of no more than six weeks for car tests; no more than three weeks for vocational tests; no more than four weeks for motorcycle tests; and no more than five weeks for the approved driving instructor practical test; to answer 90 per cent. of telephone calls to booking offices within one minute.

The key targets for the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency are to: make an efficiency gain, on the basis of overall efficiency index, of 2.2 per cent.; complete successfully 460,000 VED enforcement cases by imposition of penalties and recover through penalties and duty from induced relicensing at least £2.65 for every £1 full cost spent by DVLA on VED enforcement; deliver 95 per cent. of ordinary driving licence cases to customers within 11 working days of receipt, 95 per cent. of vocational driving licence cases within 10 working days of receipt, and 95 per cent. of first provisional driving licence cases within 10 working days of receipt; for medical cases, deliver 80 per cent. of first applications for ordinary driving licences within 35 working days of receipt, and 80 per cent. of first applications for vocational licences within 29 working days; and for cases of notification of medical condition reply in 80 per cent. of cases involving ordinary driving licences within 40 days and in 80 per cent. of cases involving vocational licences within 50 days; deliver 95 per cent. of registration documents for new vehicles within 13 working days; deliver 95 per cent. of changes to vehicle registration documents within 13 days; deliver answers to 95 per cent. of written inquiries within eight working days; answer 80 per cent. of telephone inquiries within 30 seconds; achieve percentages of documents without DVLA induced error of 96 per cent. for driving licences, 98 per cent. for registration documents for new vehicles and 93 per cent. for changes on registration documents.

The key targets for the Highways Agency are to: complete the implementation of the agency's restructuring plans to achieve running cost savings of 20 per cent. by 1996–97, compared to the 1993–94 costs, by:

(i) reducing the number of office locations from 18 to 11 by October 1995; and
(ii) reducing the number of permanent staff from 2,280 at 1 October 1994 to 1,975 full-time equivalents by 1 October 1995;

using existing management information systems, report on the agency's internal unit costs for the management and supervision of new construction schemes over £3 million in value, compared to costs in the last three years. Introduce and develop an activity costing and information system enabling: 767W unit costs for the agency's activities on new construction, maintenance and network stewardship to be developed; specific proposals for unit cost targets to be submitted to Ministers by the end of November 1995; and subject to ministerial approval, the introduction of comprehensive targets for unit costs to be set from 1996–97 onwards. In line with the objective of reducing the time taken to complete schemes, state in the agency's annual report: the average time taken to complete schemes that are completed in 1995–96 compared with the performance in recent years; and the average time between milestones for all those schemes that reach milestones in 1995–96, and compare this with previous years' performance. Complete all schemes within the approved scheme brief with performance to be measured by the number of schemes submitted to the Central Transport Group because of changes of scope or cost initiated by the Agency. Monitor, and state in the annual report, the unit cost of new construction. Monitor, and state in the annual report, the unit cost of carriageway renewal. Monitor, and state in the annual report, the benefit-cost ratio for the national roads programme based on the scheme briefs and agree with the Central Transport Group a target level for 1995–96 and following years below which the average should not fall. Carry out post-scheme evaluations on all appropriate schemes as agreed with the Central Transport Group. Reach scheme milestones for schemes in the roads programme and listed in annexe B of the business plan, as follows: award main works contracts for six of the eight publicly funded schemes; reach 90 per cent. of the other scheme milestones. Report in the annual report on progress towards the target of letting 30 per cent. of new construction contracts, by value, as design and build contracts by the end of 1996–97. If tenders represent good value for money, award four DBFO contracts and, subject to ministerial decisions, invite tenders for a further four DBFO contracts. Start 14 of the 16 major network enhancement projects listed at annexe C of the business plan and 85 per cent. of the smaller network enhancement projects listed at annexe D of the business plan. Maintain the trunk road network cost effectively by undertaking a programme of capital maintenance to preserve past investment at an optimum whole life cost, with the minimum disruption to traffic, and to ensure that roads are safe, reliable, and offer an acceptable quality of ride; and to ensure that, from 1 January 1999, all vehicles up to and including the new 40 tonnes maximum gross weight standard can use all structures supporting trunk roads and other important routes over trunk roads by, in 1995–96: renewing 134 nearside lane kilometres of motorway and 261 nlks of all purpose trunk road; assessing the structural capacity of 820 structures and upgrading 86 structures. Contribute to the Government's target of reducing road casualties by one third by the year 2000 compared to the annual average for 1981–85, by reducing casualties on the trunk road network to an average of not more than 35,000 a year over the three years 1993 to 1995. Publish, as part of the agency's annual report, a section reporting its activities to promote road safety, including the accident rate on motorways and trunk roads. Publish as part of the agency's annual report, a report on environmental aspects of new schemes, and network management and maintenance activities demonstrating that the agency has given full weight to environmental issues in carrying out its functions, and has struck a balance accordingly. Meet the aims and targets enshrined within the citizens charter, the road user's charter and the agency's charter standard statement, "Your Home and Trunk Road Proposals". 768W Continue to develop systems for measuring the performance of the network, including quality of service indicators; collect data during 1995–96; make specific proposals to Ministers by the end of November 1995; and, subject to ministerial approval, agree targets for 1996–97. In accordance with the normal rules of Government accounting, avoid breaching the cash limits on the budgets voted by Parliament for both total expenditure and running costs. Introduce accrual accounting procedures to enable an auditable set of commercial-style accounts to be produced for the 1996–97 financial year, including a balance sheet, income and expenditure account, and a cash flow statement. Produce certified appropriation accounts by August 1995.

The key targets for the Marine Safety Agency are to: review the recommendations of the IMO panel of experts convened to consider ro-ro passenger ferry safety and report by 30 June 1995 to the Department's Shipping Policy Directorate on the way forward to achieve improved safety standards; undertake trials by 31 March 1996 involving the fitting of radio transponders on a selected number of ships and press IMO through the Marine Safety Committee meeting for international acceptance of transponders including the development of performance specifications; following consultations with industry make proposals by 31 December 1995 for the introduction of intermediate safety equipment inspections of fishing vessels of 12 metres and over, and on their delegation; on deregulation, complete the internal review of all groups of merchant shipping legislation by 31 March 1995; maintain survey fee levels in real terms below those applied in 1994–95 whilst recovering the full economic cost of providing the service; work with the EU to ensure arrangements are in place by 31 December 1995 for the mandatory application of the international safety management code for passenger ships, class I and II, by 30 June 1996; undertake port state control inspections of 30 per cent. of foreign flagged vessels using UK ports including inspections of ro-ro ferries and fish factory ships; achieve an average output of 100 completed surveys and/or inspections per marine office surveyor while delivering the planned programme of surveys and inspections; manage efficiently the agency's resources so as to deliver the key targets and key tasks in the business plan within the agreed total running costs budget.

The key targets for the Transport Research Laboratory are to: conduct its business pre-privatisation so as to meet its full costs over the 12-month period; manage the business pre-privatisation so that over the 12-month period direct fee earning costs as a percentage of total operating costs are greater than 56 per cent.; achieve average staff utilisation in research resource centres of at least 1,300 hours per year on direct fee earning work; ensure that 94 per cent. of project outputs to be assessed by customers as satisfactory or better on project assessment forms; and facilitate achievement of the privatisation objectives announced by the Secretary of State on 14 March 1995.

The key targets for the Vehicle Inspectorate trading fund are to: achieve an efficiency improvement of 6 per cent. as measured by the agency's aggregate cost efficiency index; break even while achieving a 6 per cent. real rate of return on capital employed, taking one year with another; achieve an HGV/PSV test exemption rate of less than 0.01 per cent.; achieve an HGV/PSV test error rate of less than 0.47 per cent.; achieve a roadworthiness prohibition error rate of 0.5 per cent. or less; 769W return 95 per cent. of maintenance assessments for 'o' licence renewals and variations within six weeks and 99 per cent. within 12 weeks; decide 99 per cent. of all MOT statutory appeals against refusal to issue a test certificate within five working days; produce 95 per cent. of traffic enforcement reports for the traffic commissioners within four weeks or other agreed deadline; examine a minimum of 1.4 million HGV and 145,000 PSV tachograph charts; weigh a minimum of 115,000 goods vehicles; and achieve DOT weighbridge site equipment availability at 90 per cent. level nationally.

The key targets for the Vehicle Certification Agency are: to achieve a net unit cost no higher than £70.80; to achieve such quality in the production of certificate that, after issue, at least 98 per cent. do not need correction as a result of VCA-generated errors; where errors in certificates do occur, to issue corrected documents within three working days in 80 per cent. of cases; to audit at least 50 per cent. of VCA's approved quality procedures; to receive a satisfactory appraisal report on VCA's technical performance from the Department's chief mechanical engineer.