11/09/03 - Roads should be the priority: Chris writes to Commercial Motor

Roads should be the priority

The Conservatives recently unveiled excellent new transport proposals to get Britain moving again as part of the Party's 'Fair Deal for Transport' package. Restoring Britain's road building programme will also be a priority, with the Party rightly challenging the widely-held assumption that more roads create more traffic. After all, no one says there is no point building new hospitals because they will fill up with patients. All this amounts to a Conservative pledge to scrap Labour's strategy of penalising the motorist in favour of promoting a pro-travel agenda instead.

Under Labour delays on motorways and trunk roads have risen 40 per cent whilst completed road schemes have been almost non-existent. The government's argument that extra road capacity is quickly used up is not supported in other countries where motorway provision is far higher. On average, EU states have nine miles of motorway per 100,000 population. For Britain, the figure is only four miles. The argument that new roads lead to more congestion is nonsense - research commissioned by the Conservatives shows that car usage has risen directly in line with the number of people with driving licences. Congestion is a problem not because of over-dependence on cars but because Britain has far fewer miles of good quality road than its Continental counterparts. Labour has unfairly penalised motorists with higher vehicle and road taxes matched by spending cuts. Britain needs to close the gap which has widened considerably between the amount of high quality roads, trunk roads and motorways, compared with the rest of Europe. We are the number two economy and we are the number two or three country in terms of population in Europe. But in terms of our motorway network we are about number 13.

The obsession with the railways, while important for freight (especially over long distances), has got to end. The priority has to be roads - after all, nearly three quarters of us travel to work on them.

Chris D Kelly
Wolverhampton