By Richard Johnstone | 16 July 2013
The Highways Agency is to be turned into a standalone company owned by government as part of reforms to how roads are managed in England.
Following the changes, the agency will be given independence from the Department for Transport, where it is currently an executive agency, to become a separate state-owned firm, similar to Network Rail. It will be given a six-year funding agreement with government for maintenance and upgrades, which also mirrors the deals agreed between ministers and Network Rail on how to pay for improvements and enhancements to the railways.
The agency, which is responsible for managing the motorways and trunk roads in England, will be given £28bn in the initial period from 2015/16, which the DfT said represented a trebling of funding.
Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin said the reform, which was first mooted at last month's Spending Review, would help reverse ‘decades of underinvestment in roads’.
The detail of the plan is contained in a government command paper, 'Action for Roads', and there will also be legislation so future governments cannot ‘walk away from these commitments’, McLoughlin added. More than 50 major road construction and enhancement projects will now go ahead as a result of the funding certainty, he said.
‘Our major roads are vital to the prosperity of our nation, connecting people to jobs and businesses to markets. They carry a third of all traffic and two thirds of all freight traffic but in recent decades we have failed to invest properly in them.
‘That underinvestment has seen us fall behind many of our economic competitors. Since 1990, France has built more motorway miles than exist on our entire network, while Canada, Japan and Australia all spend four times more on their roads than we do.
‘Today’s changes will bring an end to the short-term thinking that has blighted investment in England's roads so that we can deliver the infrastructure our economy needs. Backed by the government’s £28bn commitment, they will give us a road network fit for the 21st century and beyond.’
