Mr (Rayleigh and Wickford)
(Con)
I beg to move,
That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision about
the regulation of roadworks; and for connected purposes.
I introduced a very similar ten-minute rule Bill in the previous
parliamentary Session, which unfortunately ran out of time.
However, under the heading of the “Can the Cones” campaign, I am
now seeking to reintroduce similar legislation to help tackle the
issue of overrunning roadworks head on.
One of the great frustrations of modern life is queuing for ages
in a line of traffic, inching forwards to get through a set of
contraflow traffic lights at the scene of some roadworks, only to
then finally crawl past a large hole in the ground, heavily coned
off, with absolutely no one working on the site. According to
data highlighted by The Echo newspaper, recent freedom of
information requests showed that during the 2021-22 financial
year there were over 77,000 street and roadworks in my county of
Essex, making it the most dug up county in Britain. But this is
by no means an issue confined to Essex.
Last week, we had a debate in Westminster Hall on this same
subject, ably secured by my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne
(), who I am pleased to say is
one of the sponsors of my Bill, which also has cross-party
support. Last week's debate was replied to by the Roads Minister,
the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, the hon. Member for
Nottingham South (). I am pleased to note
that she is in her place on the Front Bench listening today, as
she promised she would be. I thank the Minister for her
courtesy.
Roadworks can take place for a variety of reasons. Sometimes
utility companies are carrying out repairs or maintenance,
broadband providers laying new fibre, or property developers
connecting new estates to the grid. In many cases, however, the
common denominator is a lack of any palpable sense of urgency
whatever to get the job done, regardless of the inconvenience
caused to the travelling public. As a constituency MP, I have
received a growing tide of complaints about the spiralling
frequency of roadworks in recent years, with the gas utility
company Cadent being by far the worst serial offender. Last year,
in one of my villages, Hockley, a perfect storm of the above
three things occurred and led to so many concurrent roadworks
that the exasperated villagers, led by a very proactive local
councillor, Adrian Eves, resorted to nicknaming their village
“Blockley”.
Given all that, the Bill essentially has three key aims. First,
it would give local highways authorities, such as Essex county
council, much stronger powers to control the granting of permits
to anyone who wanted to dig up the highway network. This is a
critical weakness in the current arrangements. Currently,
highways authorities can only really refuse to grant a permit on
safety grounds. If those applying for one deem the work to be an
emergency, the authority's ability to refuse is weaker still. And
I am sad to report that people sometimes attempt to game the
system. The Bill would allow refusal on the grounds of causing
unacceptable disruption and would materially strengthen the hand
of councils to negotiate much tighter conditions, including
stricter deadlines when granting permits, so that companies would
hopefully be prevented from overrunning in the first place.
Secondly, the Bill would mandate highway authorities to take all
practicable steps to deconflict roadworks in their areas to
prevent multiple works in the same neighbourhood from leading to
near gridlock, especially during peak periods. Under section 59
of the New Roads and Street Works Act 1991, local authorities are
required to co-ordinate roadworks to minimise disruption to road
users. It states that a street authority
“shall use their best endeavours to co-ordinate the execution of
works of all kinds”.
Nevertheless, a few years ago we had near chaos in my home town
of Rayleigh when several sets of roadworks on the main arteries
in and out of the town were allowed to proceed at almost exactly
the same time. When we subsequently looked into why, it turned
out that the official at county hall who handed out the permits
to developers did not communicate with the one who gave them to
utility companies. In short, the left hand did not know what the
right hand was doing, which led to utter confusion and some very
frustrated constituents. The Bill seeks to rectify that, ensuring
a far more joined-up approach, by imposing much stricter
procedures on highways authorities that give out the permits. It
also seeks to prevent the same stretch of road from being dug up
multiple times, in short succession, by different companies.
Thirdly, the Bill would materially increase the fines for
roadworks that do overrun. At present, under section 74 of the
1991 Act, local highways authorities have the power to fine
utility companies for “unreasonably prolonged” occupation of the
highway. The fines to be levied are set out in the snappily
entitled Street Works (Charges for Unreasonably Prolonged
Occupation of the Highway) (England) (Amendment) Regulations
2012, with which I am sure the whole House is familiar, and which
provide for a maximum charge in respect of “traffic- sensitive”
streets of £5,000 a day for the first three days of overrun and
£10,000 a day thereafter.
However, for streets that fall outside that tightly defined
category, the fines fall away dramatically. Crucially, they have
not been updated or adjusted for inflation since 2012, and are
hardly likely to be a deterrent to major utility companies or
housing developers, some of whom just accept them—on the rare
occasions on which they are actually levied—as a cost of doing
business. The Bill would significantly increase the penalties for
overrunning beyond the schedule agreed when the permit was first
granted. Persistent offenders could be fined up to 10% of their
annual corporate turnover, which should make even the most
high-handed company sit up and listen.
Another related solution is “lane rental”—not to be confused with
“road pricing”—whereby companies must pay per day to carry out
roadworks. That gives them a clear financial incentive to be
efficient, but at present it applies to only a very limited
number of selected roads. May I suggest to the Minister that
perhaps there is scope for this solution to be much more widely
applied? I see that she is nodding.
As an experienced constituency MP, I know that it is a rare thing
for a ten-minute rule Bill to make it on to the statute book.
Nevertheless, I hope that the Government may yet be minded to
grant it time to assist its passage. Failing that, I should be
very grateful for a meeting with the Roads Minister so that we
can seek at last to “Can the Cones”, either through legislation
or, at the very least, by strengthening Government guidance to
highways authorities to achieve the same effect, short of primary
legislation itself.
No one really likes roadworks. They are sometimes a necessary
evil of modern life. Nevertheless, the spirit of this Bill is to
try to ensure that where they are really necessary, we expedite
them as quickly as practicable, with as little disruption as
possible. I promised my constituents when seeking re-election
that if they returned me to Parliament, I would seek to
reintroduce my Roadworks (Regulation) Bill, and I am keeping my
word to them today. This is not a partisan issue; it is something
on which I hope all Members of Parliament—and, even more
important, their constituents—can agree. So let us collectively
“Can the Cones”, and keep the traffic flowing as much as we
practically can. I commend the Bill to the House.
Question put and agreed to.
Ordered,
That Mr , Mr , Greg , Mrs , Sir , , Sir , , Sir , , Sir and present the Bill.
Mr accordingly presented the
Bill.
Bill read the First time; to be read a Second time on Friday 11
July 2025, and to be printed (Bill 118).
