Mark Jenkinson MP has urged Cumberland Council to reap the benefits of a multimillion-pound funding boost for roads improvements.
The Government is reallocating an additional £287m from the HS2 project between Cumberland and Westmorland and Furness Councils over the next decade.
This reallocation results in additional funding of over £130m for Cumberland Council, with nearly £2m in each of the financial years 2023/24 and 2024/25 to allow for the council to ramp up contracts. For context, Cumberland’s current baseline highways budget is c.£15m including the additional specific pothole funding, which has also increased tenfold in Cumbria since its introduction by a Conservative government in 2015.
This comes on the back of bumper investment announced at Spring Budget 2023, including a significant uplift in pothole funding.
Mark has written to Cllr Denise Rollo, Cumberland’s Executive Member for Sustainable, Resilient and Connected Places, to ensure that the local authority makes the most of this this opportunity.
Cllr Rollo had previously expressed a preference that HS2 had been built, though the high-speed rail project would have brought little in terms of direct or tangible benefits to the residents of Cumberland.
In his letter, Mark has asked for formal confirmation that Cumberland Council will publish the information requested by the Government “without delay”, and in in advance of the DfT deadlines.
The Government has asked Cumberland council to provide several key pieces of information for the purposes of transparency in good time to qualify for the maximum funding available.
Given the parlous state of our roads, it would be deeply regrettable if my constituency was to miss out on this huge funding uplift because the council has failed to get its ducks in a row.
This Government has made significant capital investment across Cumberland, resulting in higher capital budgets than in any of its predecessor councils, than at any point in time.
So far Cumberland’s track record of meeting transparency requirements has not been great – so my letter will hopefully serve as a spur to action. The council needs to put it foot down on this.
Mark Jenkinson MP
In order to qualify for the full amount, Cumberland Council must:
- Publish by 15 March 2024 a summary of the additional resurfacing work they will deliver with the new funding over the next two years;
- Thereafter provide quarterly reports, with the first by the end of June 2024, summarising the additional work they have done and listing the roads that they have resurfaced; and
- Later in 2024/25 submit a long-term plan for their use of the full 11-year funding and the transformation it will deliver.
This latest highways improvement funding is in addition to local transport funding from the last Spending Review and is over and above what local transport authorities were expecting in future.
Allocated across the next 11 years, it will represent a more than two-thirds increase in DfT support for local roads. Fifteen percent of the funds will be allocated at a later date to allow a degree of flexibility over how best to support highway maintenance initiatives across England.
