| answer text |
<p>The Government is fully committed to growing rail freight and unlocking the economic
and environmental benefits that the sector can deliver. Our Transport Decarbonisation
Plan (TDP) set out our ambition to remove all diesel-only trains (passenger and freight)
from the network by 2040. The Future of Freight Plan reflects the growing importance
of the freight sector as a whole; until now, there has never been a cross Government
and cross modal plan for the sector. In both the TDP and the William Shapps Plan for
Rail we committed to introducing a rail freight growth target and to incentivising
the early take up of low carbon traction to help operators have the confidence they
need to invest in green technologies.</p><p>We continue to encourage and incentivise
modal shift from road to rail through the £20m Mode Shift Revenue Support Scheme (MSRS),
which delivers high value for money and in 2020/21 removed around 900,000 HGV lorries
off our congested road network, saving 58,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions. Earlier this
year the Department successfully secured MSRS funding of £20m a year for the next
three years.</p>
|
|
