Roadworks: Cheshire

11:00:00

I beg to move, That this House has considered the impact of roadworks on communities in Cheshire. It is a privilege to serve under your chairship, Sir Desmond. I am grateful to you and to the House for granting me this opportunity at short notice. I particularly thank the Minister for being here as well; I know that she has an incredibly busy schedule as well as a terrible inheritance from the previous Government, which she is trying to fix. In my constituency of Macclesfield and elsewhere in Cheshire, we rely on our road network day in, day out, and it should be stable, dependable and free flowing. Over the past year, that network has become a source of constant frustration: what should be routine journeys have turned into a daily ordeal and a monotonous misery. Week in and week out, I find myself fighting to get basic roadworks resolved. I cannot quite believe that one year on in one place and six months on in another, the works are still unresolved—one year of disruption, one year of misery. That is what brings me here today. The two specific cases I want to highlight are the closure of the B5470 in Rainow and the traffic lights at the A523 Mill House bridge in Adlington. The Mill House bridge sits on the A523, which is the main road in and out of Macclesfield. It is regularly used by people heading to Manchester, Poynton, Adlington and the north—or pretty much anywhere, including Leek and Stoke to the south. The importance of that road simply cannot be overstated to residents across swathes of Cheshire. A full year ago, part of the bridge collapsed, meaning that two-way traffic was unsafe. The council acted properly, putting in place temporary traffic lights to restrict the flow of traffic to one lane at a time. Since then, to be frank, insufficient progress has been made by Ringway Jacobs, the main contractor for the council. When it comes to the delays, it has talked about the complexity of a nearby gas main and confusion over who is responsible for part of the repair. But the delays are simply unacceptable. In January, works beneath the bridge finally began, after much urging from me, but that was eight months after the traffic lights had been installed. Those works are scheduled to be completed in early summer, which basically begins next week. I probably do not need to tell you, Sir Desmond, that confidence among my constituents that the issue will be resolved in a few weeks’ time is very low because too little has happened too slowly and with insufficient communication. Expected completion dates keep getting pushed back and back with no accountability, sincere apology or explanation.

Back home, we have had the very problems that the hon. Gentleman refers to, but those doing the roadworks have found a different way of responding to exceptional circumstances. The Sydenham bypass in east Belfast in Northern Ireland is a main thoroughfare for traffic. It was closed down for the Saturday and Sunday and contractors worked solidly for those 48 hours to get the work done. It was then reopened on the Monday morning so that the commuter traffic could continue. In my constituency of Strangford, the Portaferry road was closed from 7 pm to 7 am so that all the work could be done at night; the next morning, the traffic was able to go about its business. I mention that by way of being helpful to the hon. Gentleman. Is that something that the road service in his constituency has considered?

I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising the point. Constituents mention the issue of night time works to me, but perhaps I will let the Minister comment on that in a little more detail. In Cheshire, we are really lucky to be on the fast track for devolution, which is opposed by local Conservatives. Hopefully, when we get more powers and more money from central Government, we will be able to consider such things in Cheshire ourselves. There has been too little regard for how these roadworks are impacting the public. I have a work experience student in my constituency office from my old school in Poynton, and she says that her mum describes the traffic lights on the bridge as the “bane of her life.” Traffic routinely backs up all the way to Poynton during rush hour, impacting travel in the north of the constituency. One Poynton resident complained to me that trips to Macclesfield, usually a 10-minute drive, can sometimes take up to an hour. An employee of AstraZeneca who commutes in says that every day they see large tailbacks of traffic with frustrated motorists, and all the while nobody is seen to be working on the bridge. Another Poynton resident who works in Macc has had to add 20 minutes on to his journey both ways. He says that the queues start from 7.30 in the morning and are not gone until 9.30, so they are not even possible to avoid with flexible working. Forty minutes a day, 200 minutes a week, equals over 10,000 minutes of him sitting in a traffic jam this year. That is 166 hours away from his family before he can relax—or, heaven forbid, go out for the evening. That is 10,000 minutes per person every day—and it is going up—until the bridge is safe and the traffic lights are removed. Although work sometimes takes place under the bridge out of sight from passers-by, the reality is that no matter how much progress is being made and however earnest the attempts to fix the bridge, this saga has lasted a year. Very little, if anything, took place prior to January and I have had to get increasingly involved with Ringway Jacobs and the highways team at the council. All that is simply not on. Everyone involved owes the residents across Macclesfield’s communities an apology. United Utilities gives compensation to residents if they lose their gas, electricity or internet, even for short periods. Would Ringway Jacobs even be solvent if it had to pay compensation to every driver who has experienced delays? The disruption caused by the traffic lights at Mill House Bridge pales in comparison with the horror that is the B5470. This saga started with temporary traffic lights due to the embankment structure falling away on part of the road; they were in place, causing disruption, for a few months. In January, the difficult and necessary decision was taken to close the road between Rainow and Kettleshulme after it suffered a much larger collapse of both the carriageway and the supporting embankment following heavy rainfall. The road has been fully closed since January, and I have met with the council multiple times since the closure. I have spoken to the leader and conveyed my absolute demand, on behalf of my constituents, that the road is reopened as soon as possible, because the disruption and the impact on them is profound.

It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Sir Desmond. I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend for securing this debate. The issue is having a huge impact on my constituency of High Peak. The closure of the B5470 in my hon. Friend’s constituency has made the morning drive for many of my constituents living in Whaley Bridge and Furness Vale a nightmare, with some estimating that it has added an hour on to their daily commute. Does my hon. Friend agree that enough is enough, and that Cheshire East council need to resolve this issue? We have been waiting for far too long and it is having a huge impact on our constituents’ lives. It is affecting jobs, and we really need a resolution sooner rather than later.

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. This needs to be resolved as quickly as possible. It is affecting my constituents and his. He has also been working tirelessly to get that road reopened; I thank him for working with me on that. The road closure is impacting real people’s lives. The chair of governors at Kettleshulme primary school told me months ago that the June completion date was totally unacceptable. They said: “We have families who utilise this route who will struggle with timely drop off and pick up of their children. Delivery of our curriculum is now compromised. The bus journey to Bollington for swimming lessons will take over an hour.” As a result, the school has had to cancel swimming lessons. It has also had to cancel its parents and tots sessions, as the facilitator lives in Macclesfield and can no longer get to the school on time. It has pulled out of sporting events. Any collaboration with schools, which used to be easy to organise, now requires a minimum 40-minute trip and a whole host of planning. More seriously, the school has had to stop advertising places to families in Macclesfield because it knows that no parent will sign up for an 80-minute round trip to drop off their children, even at a really good school. A company in Rainow has staff who cannot get to work because of bus cancellations. Not everyone has a car, or the time, to work their way around the road closure. One constituent said to me: “To get to Macclesfield we have to make a huge detour via Bakestonedale Road to Pott Shrigley, then through Bollington to join the A523. We cannot use our bus passes to get to Macclesfield as the bus route is basically severed in two.” Another, who has commuted to Sheffield every day for six years, said: “This road closure is significantly extending what’s already a complex drive.” They also noted that heavy goods vehicles are being forced on to narrow and unsuitable roads. The diversion is not a suitable long-term plan. Bakestonedale Road is a single lane in places, with a steep and narrow track. It is really not suitable, especially in the winter months. It has already deteriorated, with huge potholes forming. Alicia—the head at Kettleshulme—hit one of those potholes recently and, having no phone signal, was forced to walk the rest of the way to school. The diversion is also having an impact on those who live on the roads that are now seeing above-normal use. Keith Nixon, a resident on Shrigley Road, told me that as a direct result of the closure, commuters become frustrated and attempt to make up for lost time. Residents see cars travelling at well over the speed limit; he has suffered near misses twice, with vans passing within inches of him on the pavement outside his house; and of course, there are issues with noise as well.

I do not live in Cheshire, but in Staffordshire—a neighbouring county—we have been plagued by roadworks in a similar vein. The Parkside roadworks have been taking place for over 18 months now, with repeated extensions to deadlines. On the point of road safety, we have parents who are not able to get their children to school safely because the roadworks are not putting in proper crossings for those children. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is imperative that when these essential roadworks are taking place, communication from local authorities and county councils is improved, and that residents’ experiences are prioritised when we think about safety?

I agree with my hon. Friend. She is more than welcome to move to Cheshire, but I suspect her residents will not let her, because I know she is a really good champion for these issues in her constituency. The impact of the closure is widespread. The consequences of the disruption are wear and tear on roads that are not meant to be main arterial routes; the increased emissions from sitting traffic; and the loss of time in school and with family, of time in town with friends, of productivity through decreased trading, or of time spent caring for loved ones. I could go on and on—certainly, my inbox is full of stories like these. Before I wrap up, I want to spare a thought for one constituent who represents many others who have to navigate both of these disruptions every day. She lives in Disley and works in Tytherington—both in my constituency—which means she has to go around this closure and over the Mill House bridge, which I mentioned at the beginning of my speech. Like others, she is being hit by a double whammy of roadworks. Her 20-minute commute has doubled, and given that she drops her child off in Macclesfield three days a week at set times, she has had to remove the first appointment of her day from her diary. She is a physio, so she is losing money. When the things we rely on every day go wrong, the impact is huge. That is why I have been working closely with the council, feeding back these stories. I am grateful for the new sense of urgency that the highways team has—particularly since last week, when I called this debate—and I appreciate that things have to be made safe. In fairness to the council, it inherited a £100 million backlog of highway maintenance from the previous Conservative council, and we know that the austerity of the past 14 years has really impacted councils. I also appreciate that the contractor, Ringway Jacobs, used to get away with marking its own homework under a 15-year contract that was given to it recklessly by the Conservatives. However, these roadworks need to close. We need real progress for my constituents, and I am grateful that the Minister is present and will take the time to respond to the debate.

11:12:00

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Desmond. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Tim Roca) on securing this important debate regarding the impact of roadworks on communities in Cheshire, and indeed in Derbyshire and Staffordshire. I commend him on his assiduous efforts to raise the profile of the extremely difficult situation that his constituents face. Their lives are clearly being significantly impacted, as he described so vividly, with everyone from children to pensioners forced to change the way in which they live their lives, and suffering real pain and inconvenience as a result of diversions and traffic delays. As he and my hon. Friend the Member for High Peak (Jon Pearce) said, daily journeys should not be a source of misery, and as my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Leigh Ingham) highlighted, road safety must not be compromised in these circumstances. As my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield pointed out, the traffic lights on Mill House bridge have been in place for over a year, and it is absolutely right that a solution to these problems is found quickly. I know that the patience of residents is growing very thin indeed, and I understand why. I also understand that the roads have become even more of a hot topic recently, because the council has been forced to extend the permit until the end of the year to secure the road space, as several utility companies also need to carry out urgent works in the area. Although it is welcome that some co-ordinated work is going on, that of course brings a risk of further disruption to local road users over the months ahead. It is essential that the council works with the utility companies to keep that disruption to an absolute minimum, and that it considers how to expedite the works, as the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) described. I understand that the permitting extension is largely a precaution, as the council hopes that the remedial work will be done in the summer and autumn. I understand that the complexity of the work means that that cannot be guaranteed, but the council must do its utmost in consultation with local people and keep them apprised of what is going on. People’s frustration only rises when they do not understand or they are not communicated with in an adequate and timely way. As my hon. Friends have said, the appalling state of local roads in Cheshire is an indictment of the previous Government’s failure to invest in the vital national infrastructure that all our constituents rely on. It is frankly unforgiveable to allow our local road network to crumble and fail. By contrast, this Government are firmly on the side of all road users in this country. We are already delivering by providing £500 million of extra funding for highway maintenance this year, with a huge increase in funding for every local authority in England. That takes highway maintenance funding this year to nearly £1.6 billion, which is the largest ever funding amount for local highway maintenance in England in one year. We are investing those amounts precisely because we want to deliver a transformation in the condition of our highways. That means authorities have been able to make an immediate start on resurfacing roads and fixing other more significant structural problems. I want communities everywhere to start seeing the benefits. My hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield will also note the new incentive requirements announced by the Secretary of State in March this year. We are ensuring that local people can hold their local authority to account and see for themselves how the investment will be spent to maintain and improve their local highway network. We are requiring every local authority that receives funding, including Cheshire East, to publish its plans by 30 June for how it will use that extra money. That means that everyone, including the constituents of my hon. Friends the Members for Macclesfield and for High Peak, will be able to log on to their council website and see the difference the funding is making, and challenge the authority if it is not delivering. For Cheshire East council, the additional £5.54 million in highway maintenance funding that it has received this year comes on top of nearly £15.485 million in baseline funding. I am sure that funding will go a long way to help to improve roads in and around Macclesfield very soon. In addition, Cheshire East will receive more than £2 million from the integrated transport block and more than £7.7 million through the local transport grant. That is only the start. My hon. Friends will be more than aware that we are awaiting the outcome of the forthcoming spending review in the next few weeks, to agree funding beyond 2025-26. Turning back to the here and now, the more pertinent matter is how we resolve the difficult situation that is causing such distress for the constituents of my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield. It is absolutely crucial that highways officials in Cheshire East council continue their efforts to resolve it as promptly as possible, and that they keep local MPs and residents up to date. Officials have told my Department that they have been carrying out extensive drainage surveys, an ecology survey and a topographical survey to give the council a better picture of what is happening above and below ground. I note from my officials that the next stage of geotechnical surveys is due to be undertaken immediately; I believe that is on the B5470. Further actions may need to be taken in that regard. I firmly encourage Cheshire East council to keep my officials fully sighted on this matter in case further support from the Government can be provided. I know that both departmental and council officials appreciate the tight timeframe for this issue—and if they did not appreciate it before, they will appreciate it when they read the Hansard report of our debate. We are all keen to see rapid progress, so I hope those officials are listening to the debate and the representations of my hon. Friend, and they will act accordingly. I have been told that data from the surveys will be shared to allow an evidence-based decision to be taken. It is so important that local people understand the work that is being undertaken. Sometimes things take longer than expected, and sometimes there are unexpected discoveries when the council does survey work, but it needs to explain to local people what it is doing and how it will expedite the repairs. That community engagement is critical, and the highways team in my hon. Friend’s authority must work closely with the community. I understand that they have explored alternative options, such as the reopening of the old road to the south of the B5470, but from what I have been told, they do not believe that is a viable option because doing it safely would require extensive work. Those are the sort of things that they need to explain so that people are confident that they have looked at every option to reduce the disruption that my hon. Friend described. As the council is fully aware, our maintenance budgets are already allocated to all highway authorities, specifically so that they can fund repairs of this sort. There is no additional Department for Transport funding available now, but as my hon. Friend has heard, the authorities have received a substantial uplift in funding this year, which should enable them to tackle such problems. To conclude, my Department will continue to work with all parties to establish what help can be provided by the Government, both now and in the future, when we will have the evidence from the surveys being undertaken. I am more than happy to be kept up to date by my hon. Friend with how things are progressing. If I can do more to ensure that his constituents see an improvement in the position they are facing on those local roads, I would be happy to discuss that with him too. I also look forward to the conclusion of the spending review in helping to secure multi-year funding settlements for all authorities up and down England, so that councils—including Cheshire East in the constituency of my hon. Friend—have the funding they need to make long-term plans for the repair and maintenance of their road networks, including those that he mentioned today. We want everyone to have the local roads that they deserve, rather than those that they inherited from the previous Government and previous local administrations, which were simply not adequate. I am committed to doing all I can to ensure that my hon. Friend’s constituents see that improvement in the months and years ahead. Question put and agreed to.

11:23:00