Examination of witnesses (Questions 400
- 419)
WEDNESDAY 1 JULY 1998
MR JOHN
BALLARD, MR
CHRIS BREARLEY
and MR DAVID
ROWLANDS
400. And so what is the percentage then;
that is the 1 per cent to local government, is it?
(Mr Brearley) I was saying, the £114 million
PFI payments for the DBFO road schemes is about 1 per cent of
the DETR budget.
401. Who decides which programmes go ahead
and which programmes are put on hold, in the schemes, is it the
Ministers, is it your Department, or is it the Highways Agency?
(Mr Brearley) You are talking road schemes here?
402. Yes.
(Mr Brearley) Ministers will decide what the programme
is to be and what schemes go ahead and what do not.
403. The Ministry decides?
(Mr Brearley) The Ministers, yes.
404. And of the schemes that have been considered
over the past few years, as submitted by the Highways Agency,
what would be the percentage then that the Ministry have said
that they do not think should go ahead?
(Mr Brearley) I do not think I can give you a
precise answer to that question. As you know, this Government,
since arriving, first of all had an accelerated review, as it
was called, of schemes which were, so to speak, ready to go, a
year ago, and took some decisionsthere were 12 of these
schemes, I thinkabout them, and the remainder of the schemes
in the pipeline, of which in very round numbers there are about
150, have been under review during the last year, and Ministers
intend to publish the result of the roads review soon after the
Transport White Paper, which is, in turn, coming out shortly.
405. Would it be possible to let the Committee
have a breakdown as to the schemes that have been put on hold,
as decided by the Government since 1 May?
(Mr Brearley) We can certainly let you have the
list of schemes which are under review, and indeed those which
Ministers approved last year in the accelerated review, and, as
I say, shortly, soon, they will be announcing their decisions
on the remainder.
Chairman: I think,
some day, we are going to come back to you for a whole lexicon
on the definitions of "shortly".
Mr Bennett
406. On the money you have just referred
to, as far as bridges are concerned, is that simply repair, or
is that in anticipation of axle weights?
(Mr Brearley) It is in anticipation of axle weights,
that is to say, it is to do with the 40-tonne lorries, which our
derogation expires on quite soon.
407. So the whole of that sum is actually
for that, bridges?
(Mr Brearley) No, it includes maintenance as well.
408. How much then for the derogation?
(Mr Brearley) I am sorry that I have not got that
figure with me; we can let you have something afterwards, I guess.
Mr Stringer
409. You mentioned the accelerated review
of the roads scheme, and I gather there was a time when six business
schemes were allowed through, does the Department have an estimated
cost for that review?
(Mr Brearley) Do you mean the internal cost of
it, as it were?
Mr Stringer: No, the
cost, any additional cost to contracts because some are delayed,
and that is later, have you looked at whether there was a cost
to that review or not?
Chairman
410. Are these contracts which have not
been signed that have been put on hold; this is the truth, is
it not?
(Mr Brearley) None of the schemes, I think I am
right in saying, had arrived at contract stage, we were not in
that situation, and these were schemes which, for the most part,
had passed their statutory procedures and were waiting to be passed.
Mr Stringer
411. The official blessings on some of the
contracts were delayed, as I understand it?
(Mr Brearley) I think that may well be true.
412. And, normally, when that happens, unless
there is a huge downturn in the market, or a downturn in the market,
there will be a cost to it; have you estimated what the cost will
be, costs, rather?
(Mr Brearley) I do not know of a cost, but we
will ask the Highways Agency, may we, and let you know.
Mr O'Brien
413. In the programme of reviewing the new
structures of road extension, has there been consideration given
to making more efficient use of the existing network so as to
prevent new capital development?
(Mr Brearley) Very much so. This has been one
of the things that the wider roads review, not simply the review
of individual schemes but the whole approach to the national road
programme, has been looking at, and the Highways Agency have brought
out a set of Instruments which they call their "toolkit",
which might, in principle, be deployed in particular situations,
and this is ramp metering, or the reservation of lanes to particular
types of vehicle, improved methods of signing, integration with
`park and ride' facilities, and so on, a whole set of things of
that kind which they have been looking at. And the roads review
report will obviously set out, when it comes out, what Ministers
think about this and the place it has in the arrangements.
414. Who would be the best people to explain
that to the Committee, would it be the Ministers or the Highways
Agency?
(Mr Brearley) Actually, what can be done and how,
the Highways Agency would be the people.
Mr Stevenson: Could
I return to road maintenance, please, and specifically the funding
of local authorities. Earlier on, you were saying that principal
and local authority roads had suffered from underfunding and had,
in cash terms but not in real terms, returned their value. Of
course, the system is payments through the TPP system and Transport
Supplementary Grants, and so on. One of the things that has happened
over recent years is that the relationship between grants, through
that system, to local authorities, and Supplementary Credit Approvals,
of course, has changed somewhat, I think. As I understand Supplementary
Credit Approvals, it is really authority for a local authority
to borrow, and they would be responsible forcould you give
us some idea of the relationship between grants and Supplementary
Credit Approvals
Chairman: Order. I
am sorry, I am afraid the Committee must be suspended for, I will
say for ten minutes. I hope Members will try to get back in that
time. The Chairman, I must point out, is the Chairman of the Finance
Committee and is therefore paired.
The Committee suspended from 4.44 pm to 4.48 pm
for a division in the House
Chairman: Gentlemen.
Mr Stevenson.
Mr Stevenson
415. Did you get the question, the relationship
between grants and Supplementary Credit Approvals?
(Mr Brearley) If an authority has credit approval
then, as you say, it borrows the money and has to pay it back.
The actual loan servicing, the cost of the interest and of repayment
of the loan over time, is covered by Revenue Support Grant, by
an element in Revenue Support Grant, and an authority will get
a little bit more Revenue Support Grant because it has this credit
approval and raises the loan than if it did not.
416. Would you agree with the proposition,
therefore, even taking into account the mechanisms which you have
just described, this change from total grants, as the situation
used to be, to one of a mixture of grants and Supplementary Credit
Approvals has, in fact, transferred expenditure responsibility
onto local authorities, to some degree?
(Mr Brearley) It has certainly transferred a responsibility,
the Revenue Support Grant system is intended to compensate authorities
fully for the actual cost.
417. Could you comment, quickly, on my original
point, which was, have you any idea about the relationship, the
proportions, of grant and SCAs in, let us say, the latest, the
last TPP settlements?
(Mr Brearley) I can do my best. There are some
figures in Chapter 9. Perhaps we could let you have a note. But
can I just add that, apart from capital maintenance, which is
provided for through TSG and credit approvals, local authorities
spend about £1.8 billion, I am quoting from the Report here,
out of their current expenditure on road maintenance as well,
and that is, in fact, much the larger sum.
418. Very quickly, Mrs Dunwoody, we hear
that there may be proposals to change the annual settlement through
the TPP, which is pretty problematical, I think, for local authorities,
to a longer-term settlement, three years, perhaps, the Chancellor
gives us some ideas, or perhaps longer. Is this being considered
by the Department, and, if so, what are your views about that?
(Mr Ballard) It is being considered. We have the
benefit, through the Chancellor's statement the other day, of
having three-year spending limits for the Department, as a block,
and, obviously, what we are wanting to do is to carry through
as much of that forward commitment as we can to others who rely
on funding from the Department, while, obviously, retaining sufficient
flexibility to manage the block. Because it is clear that Departments
will have to manage within the resources that they are given for
that three-year period, and the ability to go the centre, the
central reserve, will be much diminished under the Chancellor's
proposals, so we must have the ability to manage.
Mr Pickles
419. So you will be able to treat the whole
three years as one unit, there would not be a question of having
to spend up or to exhaust budgetary heads at the end of one year,
you would be able to look towards your expenditure, maybe wedge
your expenditure, maybe phase your expenditure, would that be
right?
(Mr Ballard) Not entirely. Under the proposals
to be published, there will be totals for each year, these will
be spending limits for each year, but what Departments will have
is flexibility to carry forward expenditure from, let us say,
1999-2000 to 2001, so if they underspend in one year they can
carry forward expenditure. What they will not be able to do is
to bring expenditure from 2000-2001 into 1999-2000, they cannot
bring it that way.
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