Road Investment Strategy

Debate between Maria Miller and Lord McLoughlin

Monday 1st December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr McLoughlin]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. The operation of smart motorways and smart roads is encouraging. We are seeing roll-out. It is not a completely cost-free option. It is quite an expensive option, costing around £8 million a mile, but it leads to significant improvements.

[Maria Miller (Basingstoke) (Con)]

More than 900 new businesses have been created around Basingstoke in the past 12 months, so my constituents will welcome the Secretary of State’s investment in the M3 that will help to tackle some of the problems, which were ignored by the previous Government. Smart motorway technology will make M3 journey times more reliable, and resurfacing will make the M3 safer. Will my right hon. Friend make sure that those sections of the M3 that have not been resurfaced in the past 10 years and are most affected by M3 motorway noise, such as those in Basingstoke, are a priority for his £6 billion plan to put low noise resurfacing on 80% of the strategic road network, as he set out?

[Mr McLoughlin]

I hope that over the next period of the road investment strategy, we will manage to resurface some 80% of the strategic highway. I know that my right hon. Friend has campaigned for resurfacing in part of her constituency, as I admit I have done for part of my constituency, so I will look particularly at the schemes to which she refers.