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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Norman Baker)
Congratulations, Mr Weir, on a marathon session in the Chair today. I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Kingswood (Chris Skidmore) on securing this important debate and on representing his constituents so diligently in the matter. There are two strands to my response: first, the process for prioritising the funding of local major schemes in the spending review period up to 2015 and beyond; and secondly, the importance of local authorities considering a range of options for addressing transport problems in the short and longer terms and what short-term options he might consider to try to deal with the situation that he describes so eloquently.
Of course, my hon. Friend will not need to be reminded of the economic situation that the Government have inherited and that the main priority is to reduce the deficit and promote sustainable economic growth. The emergency Budget last June and the October spending review were part of that strategy. However, in the spending review, the Government recognised the importance of transport infrastructure and its ability to help the economy to grow. There is a clear link and he is right to draw attention to that link in general and to the specifics of his constituency’s science park, to which he referred.
We are committed to investing capital of £6 billion over the next four years in local transport, including £1.5 billion in local authority and major schemes. Nevertheless, over the next four years, we simply cannot afford to deliver every scheme that is being proposed. We inherited from the previous Administration a completely unrealistic pipeline of schemes that could not have been delivered, even if the economy were in its most buoyant form. We have therefore had to take tough decisions to prioritise schemes. My Department has set out a process for delivering a programme of local major schemes over the spending review period. The long lead time for developing major transport schemes means that we have only considered schemes that had already secured conditional approval or programme entry funding approval, or that had a bid for programme entry already lodged with the Department prior to the suspension of major scheme activity on 10 June 2010. That is when the portcullis came down, if I can use an appropriate metaphor for the House.
We have been keen to ensure that we get value for money and we have driven down the costs of schemes that we have been considering in the pool. That will enable us to proceed with more schemes than would have been the case if the previous Government had simply accepted the estimates available to them. We announced on 4 February this year the schemes we were approving, those we were not going to take forward and those that are in the development pool. Promoters of schemes in the development pool have until September to come back with best and final offers and we shall announce in December which ones are approved.
Despite what may have been said elsewhere, I must make it clear that the road that is the subject of this debate has, I am advised by officials, never been put forward officially to the Department for Transport for funding as a local authority major scheme. Indeed, South Gloucestershire council’s core strategy talks about the road only being a reality post-2026. So I hope that my hon. Friend would accept that it is unfair to consider funding it within the current spending review period given the process we have been through. For the record, again, despite what may have been said elsewhere, the scheme has certainly never been promised funding by the Department for Transport. I am not aware of the comments made by my ministerial predecessor some years ago, but I have asked officials to dig them out for me and let me have copies, so that I can see for the record what was said.
The Department for Transport is working on the development of a policy for prioritising and funding local authority major schemes beyond 2015. We recognise that it is not possible to progress many schemes in this period that, nevertheless, have merit and ought to be considered properly post-2015. It is our intention to move to a more devolved funding framework for major schemes, with local enterprise partnerships and others being more relevant in the process. That framework will be developed further during 2011 and I have no doubt that the Secretary of State will make a further announcement in due course about exactly how that will operate.
To answer my hon. Friend’s specific point, I can say that his proposal has not been ruled out indefinitely, but that it cannot proceed within the present time frame that I have identified up to 2015. It is certainly up to him and others to make further representations, collect local support directly from residents and also perhaps through local councils, the local enterprise partnership and others, so that when the next round of transport schemes is considered, the case has been well advanced. If he wants to do that, I encourage him to do so. In the meantime, if he wants to present a petition to me, I will certainly be happy to accept it from him and his constituents.
Moving on to the second strand of my speech, I encourage promoters of schemes to consider a range of solutions for addressing transport problems. As part of the case that my hon. Friend wants to build up and may well be building up—I encourage him to do so—it is worth drawing attention to some of the comments made hitherto about the road, so that he is aware of them. The “Greater Bristol Strategic Transport Study”, which was produced in 2006, was commissioned by the Government office for the south-west to consider the case for building the link road. For the benefit of those who have not had a chance to read the document, let me read the concluding paragraph of the section that considers the link road:
“Although the new M4 to A4174 Link road scheme has a strong economic case, mainly derived from travel time savings for journeys from outside the study area, it is not being recommended by the study. The new link would alter flow patterns in the congested area between M4 J20 and M4 J19, M32 J1 and the northern stretch of the A4174 Avon Ring Road, putting additional strain on the A4174 and causing congestion problems on the M4 to the east of the new junction with the strong likelihood that the widening of the M4 between Junctions 18A and 18 would be necessary. The improved linkage to the M4 is likely to encourage long-distance commuting to and from developments in Emersons Green and Pucklechurch, which would go against the principles of sustainable development.”
I stress that those were the comments of the Government office for the south-west in 2006. I read that out partly for the record, but also because if my hon. Friend is keen to promote his scheme, he will need to address the arguments that will be made.
However, I want to be optimistic about the short term, as well as looking at the longer-term possibilities. My hon. Friend might be interested in looking at options that provide short-term benefits. In the development pool of major schemes, to which I have referred, one is being promoted by South Gloucestershire council in conjunction with the West of England Partnership and Bristol city council. If approved, that scheme may help to address some of the congestion issues to which he has referred.
The scheme I am talking about is the North Fringe to Hengrove package, which includes a series of complementary projects that would facilitate the development of three new rapid transit routes linking the North Fringe, East Fringe and South Bristol areas via Bristol city centre. The promoters argue that the rapid transit network will provide a fast, frequent and reliable public transport service, where services run on a combination of segregated busways and bus lanes separate from car traffic. Services would be given priority over other road users at traffic signals.
Promoters argue that the scheme would provide a high-quality passenger experience, with ticket machines at stops, user-friendly electronic information displays, high-quality stop design including CCTV and lighting, and safe and secure access to stops. The network would also provide improved pedestrian and cycling measures, including new footways and cycleways and appropriate modern and safe crossing points. A decision will be made on Government support or otherwise for that scheme in December. I am not clear about whether my hon. Friend believes that that is a useful scheme. If he does, it is on the table at an advanced stage and he may want to make representations in favour of it before we take a decision later this year. I referred to that today for background. I stress that no decision has been made for or against the scheme at this stage.
The West of England Partnership has also submitted a bid to the Department for funding from the local sustainable transport fund, which I launched with the White Paper, “Creating Growth, Cutting Carbon,” earlier this year. The promoters argue that elements of that bid would help to ease congestion in the area we have been talking about by promoting an integrated package of low-carbon alternatives to single-occupancy car use. The full bid document can be found on the Travelplus website. The Department will make a decision on that bid at the end of June this year. I stress again that no decision for or against has been taken; it has not been evaluated properly. However, if that is something that my hon. Friend supports, he may want to make representations about that before we take a decision in June—not very far away.
On a more general point, I would like to mention the local transport White Paper, “Creating Growth, Cutting Carbon”, which I launched in January. It shows how the Government are empowering local authorities, from streamlining transport funding from 26 to four grants— reducing all the unnecessary, bureaucratic streams that the previous Government had—to powers in the Localism Bill. The White Paper also sets out a number of sustainable transport choices that local authorities can make for their areas, from making public transport more attractive to car-sharing clubs; from improved cycle networks to bus partnerships; and from community transport to travel planning. Those are the sorts of things that allow people to travel freely without hindering economic growth or increasing their carbon footprints. I urge local authorities to consider those options in developing solutions to transport problems. There is a further tranche of money available after tranche one.
To conclude, we have set out a process for prioritising local major transport schemes over the next four years. Consistent with our localism and decentralisation agenda, it is our intention to move towards a more devolved framework for prioritising and funding local major schemes beyond 2015. That suggests that local people’s views will perhaps be more important than they have been hitherto in deciding the priorities for local schemes. Garnering local opinion, therefore, may well be a useful exercise for my hon. Friend in the meantime. Beyond that, the local transport White Paper sets out the wide range of sustainable transport options for local authorities and others to consider to support economic growth and to reduce carbon emissions. Those two objectives are and remain the central objectives of the Department for Transport.