Budget 2018: Road tax to fund £30bn investment in English roads
Vehicle excise duty to be earmarked for major upgrades to England's road network
The government is set to announce almost £30 billion of investment in the English road network as part of the Chancellor’s budget on Monday.
Philip Hammond will announce that the bulk of the money will be used for a £28.8 billion fund for Highways England to spend on upgrading and maintaining motorways and other major roads. The bulk of that cash will come from vehicle excise duty, which will be exclusively used for the scheme. It is the first time road tax has been spent only on the UK’s road network.
The spending will mark a 40 per cent improvement on the £17.6 billion the UK Treasury spent in the previous five-year investment cycle.
Alongside that investment, Hammond is set to earmark £420 million for distribution to councils to fix potholes and carry out other road repairs, and £150m for improving local road junctions.
The spending will be in addition to the existing £1.3 billion highways maintenance budget, and the previously announced pothole repair fund of £300 million.
The investment plan was welcomes by Matthew Fell, the boss of the CBI, which represents UK companies, who said “investing so significantly in our roads could help ease the all-too real delays that people face just getting to work.”
The Budget will also include a fund to establish ‘future mobility zones’ in three cities, where schemes such as self-driving vehicles can be tested.
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