Highways (Financing) Bill

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

2nd reading
Thursday 15th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Olly Glover]

The right hon. Gentleman is right to say that if we are to go down that road, it needs to be transparent and done in a way that gives confidence to consumers. Car drivers and road users are consumers, and we should think of them in the same way we do customers on the railway or on planes. If such a thing is to be done, it must be done with great care and thought. That is why we need to scrutinise the legislation carefully.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

Such schemes are hardly new: in London, we have had the congestion charge for many years now—[Interruption.] We have it elsewhere, too; drivers in and around our major cities are used to a charge they have to include in their budgets.

[Olly Glover]

Yes, London is another example of where some of these things are already happening, but the fact that they have been controversial at times is exactly why they need to be done with thought and, ideally, in a manner that avoids some of the interminable cultural wars that we must always have on every topic these days. Instead, they should be done with consensus and based on sound reason and analysis.

We are not satisfied that the Bill as drafted provides that transparency and accountability, so we will not take a view on it as a whole today. We hope that the Government will be more receptive to some of our ideas to improving the Bill at later Commons stages than perhaps they have been hitherto.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Christopher Chope]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that observation. That is why we need to be very sceptical about what the Government are proposing.

Let us look at the issue of the lower Thames crossing. I read that it is going to cost £10 billion, and people will ask how we are going to raise that money. It seems to me that it will not be difficult to get the capital from the private sector, if a return can be obtained on that capital. Indeed, when Sir Nigel Broackes, who was the boss of Trafalgar House, was bidding for the Dartford crossing, he obtained the capital from the Bank of America. I do not think there is any doubt that the money will be forthcoming, but what will be the cost of the whole project? Will it have a finite cost of, say, £10 billion? If so, over how long a period will the Government allow the operator and the construction vehicle to have that paid back? Will the tolls be designed to pay back the cost of the tunnel within 20 years, 30 years or 50 years? The answer to that question will determine the level of the tolls. Are they going to be affordable? My view is that it is reasonable that this infrastructure be paid for by the people who will use it. I do not have a quarrel with that.

[Ruth Cadbury]

It is been interesting to listen to the former Minister, who has had a distinguished career. I cannot speak about the former funding of the Dartford crossing, but does he not recognise that under this RAB model, which is overseen by the Office of Rail and Road, as are other RAB projects, funding is in effect hypothecated to the scheme? That is clear and transparent, unlike the situation that he mentioned, in which drivers did not know whether the funding that they provided was being merged with general taxation income. On how long this will last, surely that depends on the risk, and the length of time for which investors are prepared to take on the licence, when they bid to Government.

[Sir Christopher Chope]

I hear what the hon. Lady says, but the question I am asking is: why can we not have dedicated legislation for the lower Thames crossing, as we did for the Dartford-Thurrock crossing? In the primary legislation that went through this House, it was specified that there should be tolls only for the length of time it took to repay the costs of construction. Subsequent Governments changed that in the way that I have described, because any legislation can obviously be changed by a subsequent Parliament.

[Ruth Cadbury]

I appreciate the hon. Member’s response, but as this Bill makes clear, the funding through the RAB model of the lower Thames crossing and other schemes is not only for construction, but for ongoing maintenance, necessary improvements and so on. It is a long-term scheme, and is not merely for the cost of the construction.

[Sir Christopher Chope]

I understand that, and one of my concerns is that we may find that the tolls continue far into the distant future, when there will no longer be a need for tolls to pay for the maintenance of the infrastructure. In a sense, the model espoused for the lower Thames crossing project could have exactly the same consequence for motorists, which is that they will end up paying a lot more than the cost of the tunnel. I hope that the Minister can explain why we could not have had specific, ringfenced legislation on this, instead of a general Bill. If we could have had that, we could have made a lot more progress.

I am delighted that my right hon. Friend the Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Holden) is saying that we Conservatives would like to leave the Aarhus convention, because it inhibits progress on such projects. I remember all the difficulties we had with the European Union when I was the roads Minister; EU legislation was preventing the completion of the M3 through Twyford down. That environmental interference ultimately cost our economy a significant amount of money, but when anybody uses the M3, they see that it just blends into the landscape and is a really well designed project.

The question I put to my right hon. Friend, rhetorically, was: why did we not do something about the Aarhus convention when we were in government? On this, as on a lot of things, I am delighted that the leader of the Conservative party is showing herself to be a real Conservative. I fear that that we are still suffering from the hangover of a so-called Conservative Government who did not get to grips with issues such as the Aarhus convention, so I am very much with my right hon. Friend on that.

I intervened about the scope for extending the Bill to projects not currently a part of the main highway network or trunk road network. If we want to deal with the problems to do with London bridges, we will have to find some way to fund bridge repairs. I have an interest: my home in London for many years was just south of Waterloo Bridge. Recently, we heard rumours that the bridge may have to close because of cracks in it. If it is closed, that will be the third unusable central London Thames crossing. That is intolerable. Surely, we must find a way of funding the repairs and the reconstruction necessary to keep those London bridges open. My grandchildren talk about London Bridge falling down and all the rest of it, but we are not talking about London Bridge. Three other key bridges in London are either already closed or about to be closed. What are we going to do about that? I would be interested if the Minister is prepared to say, “Yes, I agree that the model set out in the Bill could be applied to the bridges in London that are in desperate need of repair.”

--- Later in debate ---

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Christchurch (Sir Christopher Chope), given his deep experience and interesting perspective on bringing in tolls for all our motorways. That may be what happens in certain countries, but I suspect the whole funding of their road network is somewhat different from ours, so I will go back to focusing on the Bill.

I have driven on roads in other countries, and across the bridge to Wales in the past, and it seems entirely natural to me for us to introduce a toll for the lower Thames crossing. It is parallel to the tolled Dartford crossing, and it is hardly going to be the first toll road in the UK. I welcome the Bill, which will enable the funding of the lower Thames crossing to be delivered and maintained through tunnel users paying to use it. It is the first time that a road project has used the RAB model—a model that is already used for energy, water infrastructure and Heathrow airport.

Delivering improved transport infrastructure is core to this Government’s growth mission, so I am glad that the Government are exploring a range of both tried and tested and new methods of working with private sector investors to deliver projects. Those include using RAB for the roads for the first time—as in the Bill—as well as using the community infrastructure levy and further exploring the capture of land-value uplift on new rail schemes. Some of the early private finance initiative schemes in the mid and late ’90s gave public-private funding partnerships a bad name, but I am confident that the relationship between state commissioners and long-term private capital has matured in a way that can only be mutually beneficial.

On the RAB model, however, I do have some concerns. While it provides confidence for investors and a rock-solid return—as the representative of potential investors in the lower Thames crossing told me—there is also a history of gold-plated, over-engineered schemes. Sometimes, as in the case of Heathrow airport, it can be poor value for money, as airlines and businesses that are captive tenants there tell me. All of Thames Water’s bill payers are funding the Thames Tideway tunnel—a project that provides no benefit to my constituency or the health of the River Thames in my constituency, as we are upstream of the intake of the Tideway tunnel.

While there is a regulator in the Bill—the Office of Rail and Road plays an important role—I wonder, as I do with many regulators, whether it has sufficient teeth and funding. Does it have the right powers and sufficient powers over issues such as sustainability, safety, customer focus and local communities? To look again at the example of Heathrow airport, I fear that the Civil Aviation Authority is far too weak in areas other than its core responsibilities of the economy and, of course, air safety.

There is one final issue with the lower Thames crossing that has been exercising both myself and the road haulage industry: the removal of any truck stop or motorway service area from the plans. The Transport Committee produced a report on this matter in 2022, when the hon. Member for Mid Buckinghamshire (Greg Smith), who is now on the Opposition Front Bench, was on the Committee. Our conclusions showed the critical impact of the shortage of safe, secure driver facilities around the south-east, and particularly on routes to and from Dover.

That message was repeated to the Transport Committee in March this year by the haulage industry and driver union representatives. Drivers are required to rest every 4.5 hours and need somewhere to stop and sleep in a place where they and their load are safe, yet we were told that at Medway and Thurrock services, on either side of the Thames, if a driver is not in the motorway service area by mid-afternoon, they would have to go and find an A road lay-by, meaning no toilets, no food and no safety.

[Jen Craft]

My hon. Friend mentioned Thurrock services. Thurrock is an area that will be heavily impacted by the lower Thames crossing, so I am very glad that she mentions the lack of a service station built into the plans. We already have significant issues with lorry drivers parking in inappropriate places on roads that are not built for that purpose, in order to get the rest that they need because they cannot get into a service station. Does my hon. Friend believe that the lack of a services facility as part of the lower Thames crossing will exacerbate that issue?

[Ruth Cadbury]

I absolutely believe that it will exacerbate the issue, because the lower Thames crossing will significantly increase vehicle throughput, particularly of trucks and lorries, on what is already a busy part of the network.

The originally proposed MSA or truck stop—I am not sure which—has been removed from the plans, and I am told that there is no plan and no requirement to bring one back. This illustrates a national policy gap. In the French motorway system, there is a full MSA every 50 km and partial ones every 10 km. I am told that it is not too late for proposals, and I really do hope that that is the case, although there would have to be a planning application from a landowner in order to bring one in. I cannot believe that it would not be a profitable opportunity for investors to do that and then in due course to link it into the lower Thames crossing, because of course it is only just along the road from the docks, so there is bound to be demand.

The Opposition amendment says:

“this House…declines to give a Second Reading to the Highways (Financing) Bill, because it has no confidence in the Government’s ability to deliver the project on time and on budget, given its record of cancelling major road schemes across the country”

and risks costs

“spiralling further out of control”.

That is rich coming from the party that oversaw most of HS2’s lifespan. HS2 is so desperately needed by our rail system and northern cities, yet what did the Conservatives do when in government? They started construction before the design was agreed and complete, then halted it and removed about half the length of HS2, thus completely undermining the business case. I could go on.

The lower Thames crossing was commissioned because the Dartford crossing has miles-long queues leading on to it. Extra lanes have been built on the M25, and we have all-lane running on many other motorways, yet on many of them traffic still crawls along at slow speeds due to the sheer level of congestion. While there is no doubt that the lower Thames crossing will relieve pressure on the existing Thames crossings for a few years after it opens, how long will it be until the toll payers are effectively paying to park on the approach road instead to cross to the other side of the Thames?

The DFT forecasts that road traffic will grow by 12% on motorways and 10% on all other roads over the next 10 years. To ensure that our roads do not grind to a halt, I really look forward to a policy that incentivises alternative travel options so that road space is available for those journeys for which there is no choice but to drive. For instance, increasing capacity at the Ely and Haughley junctions, or any number of other rail bottlenecks, would increase rail capacity for freight and passengers at a fraction of the cost of the lower Thames crossing or of opening another lane on a UK motorway.

I do hope that my hon. Friend the Minister and the Secretary of State can provide some assurance to me and this House. Unless there is an overarching transport strategy that supports modal shift, it will not be long before we need an even lower Thames crossing.