Autumn Statement: Infrastructure projects welcomed
STEPS outlined by the Chancellor to improve the infrastructure of the West Midlands as part of the new National Infrastructure Plan have been welcomed by business leaders.
Michael Ward, president of Birmingham Chamber of Commerce Group, said: “The chamber welcomes the Chancellor’s commitment of an extra £5bn of capital investment for big, strategic infrastructure projects including broadband. Too often after a recession infrastructure investment is seen as an easy budget to cut and this lack of long termism can be seen in the bottlenecks of our roads and railways.
“Investment in infrastructure in the West Midlands of £110m for the A45/46 toll bar end improvement scheme, £270m for two new managed motorways, one of them using the hard shoulder on the M6; support for Tax Increment Financing and speeding up of planning approvals are vital to keep our economy moving and will create jobs and growth but more importantly it will make Britain more attractive to investors and make it easier to do business.
“However we would urge the government to ensure that this investment does not draw money away from maintaining our local roads. While it is vital that we have world class infrastructure we must also ensure that we get the basics right.”
Infrastructure projects in the West Midlands included as part of the National Infrastructure Plan are:
• M6 managed motorway scheme between Birmingham and Manchester
• A45 Westbound Bridge (Solihull) – Replacement bridge over the West Coast Main Line close to Birmingham Airport on the A45 strategic corridor into Birmingham
• Evesham Bridge Maintenance (Evesham) – Rebuilding of the main bridge into Evesham from the South
• A45/46 Tollbar End improvement scheme
• A45 Corridor (Damson Parkway to M42 junction 6) diversion
On the Strategic Rail Freight Network (SFRN), the Government will support Network Rail to invest £55m in the SRFN to help deliver schemes that remove bottlenecks and improve capability and longer-term connectivity to the UK’s major ports.
This will include the Ely-Soham doubling scheme to remove a bottleneck on the Felixstowe-Nuneaton route, and gauge clearance of additional rail freight routes in the Midlands between Syston junction and Stoke.
Richard Butler, CBI Regional Director for the West Midlands and Oxfordshire said while macro-economic conditions continued to be difficult the infrastructure measures at least offered some encouragement for the region.
