Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of local government reorganisation on the (a) implementation of transport infrastructure projects and (b) strategic planning.

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government is the lead department for the planning system, and the Department for Transport works with it closely on the impacts of local government reorganisation.

Existing district councils have responsibilities for taxi licencing and spatial planning, but transport infrastructure is generally delivered by county and unitary authorities. New unitary authorities formed by local government reorganisation should have appropriate scale to effectively deliver transport infrastructure projects and, outside of Strategic Authorities, to undertake their local transport authority responsibilities.