September 30, 2019
Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sajid Javid, has set out major new plans for investment alongside further measures to tackle the housing crisis.
In his speech at Conservative Party Conference today, he laid out plans for fibre broadband, roads, and buses to supercharge infrastructure all over the UK.
When we get Brexit done, we will have a powerful Conservative housing and infrastructure policy that delivers a boost to our economy and helps more to realise the dream of owning their own home.
Today, the Chancellor set out his £29bn delivery plan to upgrade key roads over the next five years – strategic and local roads up and down the United Kingdom. That includes money to improve the M60 Simister Island in Manchester to tackle delays, to start construction on the A428 to improve journeys between Cambridge and Milton Keynes, and a litany of other road-building projects.
In addition, Sajid Javid announced an ambitious National Bus Strategy to to transform bus services across England.
The Strategy will be funded by the £220 million announced in the Spending Review, with half of that funding going towards additional bus services. It will also give local authorities who want to create London-style franchised services in their areas more powers and support to do so.
This plan includes the creation of Britain’s first ever all-electric bus town to help deliver more eco-friendly and better value for money for passengers. We’ll make £50 million available for this project, and we have already invested around £150 million to replace and upgrade the bus fleet.
This will result in more than 1,300 low emission buses on our roads, as well as an extra 263 zero emission buses on the way.
We’re also launching new low-fare, high-frequency ‘superbus’ networks, allowing passengers more choice and lower prices. We will give local authorities the power to partner with bus companies to create new superbus networks. In exchange for the local authority investing more in bus lanes, bus operators will run more services, at a lower cost.
The first superbus network will be launched in Cornwall next year, with fares starting from just £1.
We recognise that many bus services are absolutely vital for connecting communities, especially in rural areas. Sometimes they are not commercially viable, but they often provide an enormous social good and we would be worse off as a society if we lost them.
That’s why we’re spending an additional £30 million to improve existing routes and restore lost services, making sure that no community is left behind or cut off. We’ve already made £250 million available to support these and will now spend an additional £30 million in 2020-21 to improve current services, or restore lost ones.
Our policy will help support our existing housing policy to give people across the United Kingdom access to the infrastructure, buses, and broadband they need to use the internet at home and run productive businesses.
Commenting, Therese Coffey, Secretary of State for the Department of Work and Pensions, said:
“Corbyn’s Pension Tax will see ten million savers facing a huge bill forcing them to delay their retirement for almost three and a half years.
“This is just one of the ways a Corbyn government would hammer hardworking people on top of his plans to hike up taxes by £2,400 a year, as well as the cost of his plan for unlimited immigration and the chaos of 2020 being dominated by two more referendums – one on Brexit and another on Scottish independence.
“Only Boris Johnson and the Conservative Party can get Brexit done with a deal, get parliament working again and turbocharge our economy to unleash Britain’s potential.”
Read more about how this Pension Tax will impact millions of savers (PDF)
