Duncan Hames
Main Page: Duncan Hames (Liberal Democrat - Chippenham)Department Debates - View all Duncan Hames's debates with the Department for Transport
(9 years, 10 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr McLoughlin
My right hon. Friend rightly points out the allocation that has been made to Kent. As I said, in this Parliament we have increased by 27% what the previous Government spent on road maintenance, and in December I announced another funding increase of more than 20%. I hope that we see a fair sharing of it across the whole of the community—in both urban and rural areas.
Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)
The extra £86 million allocated to fix and improve Wiltshire’s roads over the next six years is very welcome. What steps is the Secretary of State taking to ensure that this is indeed additional money spent on our roads and that councils do not use it to top up their reserves, or displace money that otherwise would have been spent on roads to meet other spending pressures?
Mr McLoughlin
Overall, local authorities do take their highway maintenance projects seriously. I point out to the hon. Gentleman that one cannot argue for localism and then argue all the time for central direction. However, I very much hope that all authorities that have been allocated the money spend it on the roads. Some other funds are available, and we will judge what local authorities have done regarding how those funds are distributed.