HC Deb 31 October 1996 vol 284 cc802-16

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mrs. Lait.]

4.29 pm
Mr. Stephen Day (Cheadle)

I wish to raise a matter of considerable importance and interest in my constituency and I am grateful for the opportunity for this Adjournment debate to do so. My hon. Friend the Minister for Railways and Roads visited my constituency and saw some of the problems that I wish to mention, so he is aware of the difficulties facing my constituents because the Manchester airport eastern link road—the MAELR—has not been completed.

The central section of the road, from the new A34 bypass—running north-south through my constituency—runs from the A34(M) in the west to Woodford road in Bramhall. My hon. Friend visited Woodford road in Bramhall to see the junction that has been located where none was originally envisaged. That junction has created terrific traffic problems in the villages of Woodford and Bramhall.

While the central section is welcome in itself, it can be properly welcomed only when the whole road has been completed: the central section alone has perhaps created more problems than it has solved. The central section was built with the aid of some private finance, which meant that it was finished well ahead of the other two sections in the west and east.

At the time of the public inquiry into the central section of MAELR, it was estimated that there would be an extra 15,000 to 20,000 daily car movements owing to the two out-of-town shopping developments. Those two developments contributed financially to the building of the central section. There is no doubt that those stores are a great success, but their commercial success has produced massive traffic problems. I shall give evidence to show that the increase in traffic has gone way beyond that anticipated at the time of the public inquiry.

My constituents and I are also annoyed that the constituency has had to wait 30 years for the road. The line has been laid down in some form or other for that long, but there is still not a complete bypass around the area that I am privileged to represent. There is merely a third of a bypass, which benefits the shopping cities, but does little to alleviate the constituency's traffic congestion. Indeed, the congestion will be worse until the Government build the rest of the MAELR.

The eastern section of the MAELR runs from Woodford road in Bramhall, through to the A523 Poynton road and will hopefully eventually link up to the proposed A6(M) Hazel Grove bypass. Congestion in Bramhall village, Woodford road and Chester road in Woodford and in Poynton—in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Winterton)—has become intolerable. I shall give evidence of the scale of public concern within those areas and I am sure that my hon. Friend will too.

There is a lot of annoyance in the villages of Woodford and Bramhall at the increased traffic congestion, with heavy goods vehicles and cars coming on to the end of the MAELR, not only to reach the new shopping cities, but to reach the M63 by way of the MAELR and the A34(M). Of course, no junction was ever intended at the point of entry to the MAELR in Woodford road at Bramhall, so the annoyance to residents who have to suffer the traffic has to he witnessed to be believed—their feelings are entirely justified.

When my hon. Friend the Minister visited Woodford road and saw the junction to which I referred, he met representatives of Bramhall and Woodford community councils. They expressed residents' views, but—being community council representatives—they were perhaps more polite than residents would have been if my hon. Friend and I had walked along Woodford road and knocked on their doors.

The western section of the MAELR will require building from the A34(M) through to the M56—what could be called the airport link. Traffic that would have bypassed Heald Green had the original scheme gone through in its entirety now comes off the central section of the MAELR and, if travelling west, comes on to the old A34 and goes straight on to Finney lane, which is the east-west route to the airport, through the village of Heald Green.

Again, the central section has brought no relief to my constituents, but merely more traffic—traffic that is of no benefit to the area I represent. The central section has increased traffic congestion significantly. Stockport metropolitan borough council monitored traffic and found that there had been a 30 per cent. increase in daily traffic along Finney lane, which is the only available western route at the western end of the central section for traffic going to the airport. Knowing how important Manchester airport is, my hon. Friend the Minister will realise the scale of that traffic.

Many developments have been proposed for the area: some are in the pipeline—approved but not yet built—and others are at some stage of the planning process. Their impact should not be underestimated and lend significant weight to the case for an early completion of both the western and the eastern sections of the Manchester airport eastern link road.

At Cheadle Royal hospital, which is adjacent to the old A34 and the shopping city at Cheadle Royal in what was Bruntford park, extra housing and commercial properties are at various stages of planning or build. They can only increase the traffic pressure on the old A34 and, indeed. the central section and surrounding roads.

At Hanforth Dean, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Tatton (Mr. Hamilton), there is a large shopping development—one of the those that contributed toward meeting the cost of the central section of the MAELR. Construction on that development will continue—some with planning permission, some without—to enlarge the leisure and retail complex that is already there and generating the extra 15,000 to 20,000 car movements a day.

A little further north up the A34 we have a proposal for a multiplex cinema which, if built, will be the biggest in the country. I hasten to add that, although they are not my hon. Friend the Minister's concern, I opposed all those developments—for reasons that are obvious, given the traffic congestion that we already suffer—and some of them will be subject to public inquiries.

There is also a proposal for a plastics factory to be built next to the multiplex cinema-all that on the Sharston-Gatley boundary, which is also the boundary between the city of Manchester and the borough of Stockport, and not far from the M63 and the new A34 bypass. That would increase local traffic flowing on to local roads in my area, turning one of the most pleasant parts of the country—as I am sure my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield would agree—and a lovely residential constituency into sheer hell for many of my constituents. That is not good enough.

I ask my hon. Friend the Minister to take into account the possibility that Manchester will get a second runway. The matter is before the Secretaries of State for Transport and for the Environment, who will make the final decision. The increased traffic would be intolerable if the proposal went ahead, in addition to all the developments that I have mentioned and the extra traffic that has been generated, over and above that expected by the public inquiry. It would be inexcusable if approval were given for a second runway without the MAELR being completed all the way through from the M56 to the A6(M).

There has just been a public inquiry into a proposal for opencast mining at Poynton, which would affect my constituency and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield. God forbid that that development should go ahead, but if it does, extra traffic pressures—very heavy traffic—will result.

The completed MAELR scheme from the M56 to the A6(M) was designed to cope with traffic levels anticipated in conjunction with a single runway al Manchester. A second runway would demand not only the completion of MAELR, but substantial upgrading to cope with yet more traffic.

The Commonwealth games are to be held in Manchester in 2002. Part of the grand south Manchester bypass system is, however, nothing more than a joke and a grand driveway to Sainsbury's car park at Cheadle Royal. That is the best way to describe it and the only function that it fulfils—apart from creating massive problems for my constituents.

The need to complete the road is recognised by other hon. Members. I welcome the fact that my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield wishes to contribute to the debate. Other hon. Members have given their permission for me to cite their support for my argument. The hon. Member for Stockport (Ms Coffey) writes: This long-standing scheme which will bring benefits to airport users and all the residents of Stockport has my total backing. My hon. Friend the Member for Altrincham and Sale (Sir F. Montgomery) states: I believe that this scheme will bring major benefits to our area and allow the full benefits for the A34 by-pass to be realised. I think it will also ease a lot of congestion on the roads which will be of benefit to local residents. I realise that there is enormous support for this scheme in your constituency"— that is, Cheadle and I would also like to give you my full support. The right hon. Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Morris) wanted very much to contribute brietly to the debate and, as his constituency neighbour, I should have been glad to allow him to do so, but because of a family bereavement, he cannot be present. He has asked me to read on to the record his support for my case. He states: This long-standing scheme will bring major benefits to South Manchester/North Cheshire and allow the full benefits of the A34 by-pass to be realised. In particular, it will improve access to the Airport from the south and east and remove traffic from congested roads through residential areas. This will benefit passengers and staff as well as local residents. While the full benefits of the MAELR will require the completion of the A6 Stockport by-pass"— amen to that even without this there will be significant local benefits. I understand the Airport Company fully support the completion of the remaining sections and that its planning has been designed so as to be compatible with MAELR. It"— that is, the airport would be prepared to fully co-operate in any initiatives to progress MAELR." The right hon. Gentleman asked me to mention also that residents of his constituency have expressed concern about the impact of the second runway construction traffic coming from the Peak district in the absence of MAELR.

I shall show my hon. Friend the Minister my file of constituents' letters on MAELR. I have been inundated with letters, and rightly so—that is my job. I want to pass on not only my constituents' concerns, but their anger at being left with one third of a road that is of no use to anyone and is causing more problems than we had before. We desperately need the road to be completed. If, at the end of the debate I have impressed on my hon. Friend the Minister the importance of the road to the area, I shall be well satisfied.

I shall read the most recent letter that I received. A few letters arrived today, as people in my constituency heard about the debate. A resident of Woodford road writes: The traffic situation is quite unbearable on Woodford Road from early in the morning to late at night. In the rush hours the traffic is solid and frequently at a standstill. The volume and speed of the traffic at other times is such that access onto Woodford Road involves a long wait and a frantic dash on most occasions. Lots of heavy vehicles use the new bypass as a better access to the M63 than other routes, and will drive from Hazel Grove, Disley etc. at all hours of the day or night to gain access to it. That is the living reality for people on Woodford road, where no junction was ever intended.

I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will repeat what he told me when he visited Bramhall and that he will give an assurance that when the eastern section of the MAELR is completed—sooner rather than later, I hope—the junction at Woodford road will be closed and returned to its original planned status as a proper bypass for Bramhall and Woodford.

I have a letter from councillor Kenneth Holt, who represents the Bramhall East ward on Stockport metropolitan borough council. He states: The partial completion of MAELR has increased traffic flows in and around Bramhall throughout the day to levels only previously experienced in the rush hour with journeys to and from local industry. The huge volumes of through traffic are making local traffic manoeuvres particularly difficult. and of course significantly increasing the hazards to local schoolchildren and all other pedestrians." I can vouch for that. Crossing the road in Bramhall village is a nightmare, and it is a brave person who dares to cross Woodford road.

Councillor Peter Burns, an independent councillor representing the Heald Green ratepayers association, also sent me a letter of support. He says: I write on behalf of the Heald Green community of some 15,000 residents…For many years the community of Heald Green has been seriously damaged by the amount of East-West traffic along Finney Lane. the main road through the village. This road provides the only decent bridge for East-West traffic over the North-South railway and, therefore, is the route for traffic to and from the East and South-East, bound for the motorway network and Manchester Airport… Recent traffic counts by my Council"— that is, Stockport metropolitan council— have shown 30 per cent. increase in the daily traffic flow along Finney Lane. This has been achieved not by increasing the already saturated number of vehicles per hour but by extending the number of hours of this saturation. The only way to relieve the ever-worsening ill health, danger and environmental damage being caused, is by the construction of the western section of the MAELR Route.- I do not disagree with Councillor Burns.

Woodford community council has sent a brief letter of support for the completion of the road scheme. Its chairman, Bryan Leck, says: As Chairman of the Woodford Community Council my members would strongly support your campaign to ensure that the extension from the Woodford Road roundabout in an easterly direction be expedited. The completion of the central section has caused horrendous problems in the Bramhall and Woodford area which can only be alleviated by the construction of the eastern section of the road.

The chairman of Bramhall community council wrote: The leisure centres on the A34 sharing the Cheadle Royal Hospital site"— to which I referred earlier— opposite the J. Sainsburys-John Lewis shopping complex have been opened recently. They will attract more traffic. He wrote that he was grateful that the Secretary of State for the Environment had called in some of those applications, and continued: Now the enquiry into the application for opencast coalmining on Towers Farm, Poynton, near to the Hazel Grove 5 ways road junction, has just been completed. He says that the short distances between those local developments emphasise the potential for increased traffic congestion in Bramhall. He then wrote: Therefore you can well understand why an Action Committee has been set up to urge the completion of the east and west sections of MAELR as soon as possible. The residents of Hazel Grove, Poynton, Woodford and Bramhall held a public meeting in Poynton on October 7 1996 to appoint a committee which met a week later." I have a letter from one of the founders of the MAELR and Poynton bypass campaign—a constituent of mine who lives on Chester road in Woodford—which said: I write to express my growing concern about the increasing levels of traffic using unsuitable roads through Woodford, Bramhall and Poynton which have resulted from the partial completion of MAELR… I am particularly concerned that the daily traffic levels are already well in excess of the projected level of 18,000 for the year 2009, a figure which was submitted to the Public Inquiry in 1992. Almost 20,000 vehicles per day were measured by Cheshire County Council along Woodford Road south of the MAELR's 'temporary' termination point in May this year, barely six months after the central section of MAELR was opened. The resultant increase in traffic is causing considerable congestion and delay for road users as well as excessive noise and pollution for residents, pedestrians and cyclists along the existing roads. More worrying is the large increase in traffic resulting from heavy lorries, over 10 per cent. of the traffic or 2000 vehicles per day is now in this category, and this extends from early morning and late into the evening. The result is considerable additional noise, vibration and pollution. a particular concern when there is a weight of evidence confirming the effect on health of particulates arising from diesel vehicles. Large vehicles on the narrow roads also pose considerable dangers for cyclists and for those using the pavement or attempting to cross the road. There is considerable support for the completion of this scheme, from residents and businesses throughout Bramhall, Woodford and Poynton, but growing anger that the scheme could have been allowed to proceed in part only with a totally unsatisfactory 'temporary' termination on Woodford Road—in spite of the weight of objections presented at the public inquiry. Stepping aside from my constituent's letter for a moment, I can tell the Minister that at the time of the public inquiry I was one of those who warned of the dangers that would result if construction of the central section went ahead. I hate to say, "I told you so," because I wish that I had been proved wrong. I am afraid that the residents' warnings about the dangers of building only the central section have proved to be correct.

My constituent continued: The decision to proceed with MAELR on a partial basis has, in the short period since its completion in November 1995, proved to be totally unsatisfactory, causing severe congestion and all the attendant noise …I would therefore wish the scheme to he progressed to completion without further delay to enable the people of Woodford, Bramhall and Poynton to he relieved of the distress caused by the wholly unacceptable and growing levels of traffic on our roads which have resulted. The last letter of support is from Manchester Airport, and I am pleased to have received it. It says that the MAELR Will bring major benefits to South Manchester and North Cheshire and allow the full benefits of the recently completed A34 by-pass to be realised. It will also improve access to the Airport…remove through traffic from congested roads through residential areas. Obviously, the full benefits of the completed MAELR scheme will also require the completion of the A6…by-pass". That bypass is not the subject of the debate, but it is on the minds of my constituents and many others in the area. The letter continues: The Airport Company fully support the completion of the remaining sections and we have joined forces with the Local Authorities to try and progress the road. Thus we would be more than happy to fully co-operate in any initiatives which come forward to progress MAELR particularly once the uncertainty about our own future growth prospects have been resolved." Will the Minister please talk to the people who have commercial or potential commercial interests in the area, and let us get the road completed at the earliest possible opportunity?

I want to show the Minister a petition signed by more than 6,000 people, all of whom are my constituents. The names were collected over the summer months, during the recess. More forms are still to be collected from other petition points. I hope that when we reach the target figure of 10,000—which I expect to happen shortly—he will accede to my request and ask the Secretary of State to receive this petition, because it is addressed to him. It expresses the concern of 6,000 of my constituents in Cheadle. As I said, my hon. Friend can expect more names before we are done.

The road is vital to the well-being of my constituency. Support for the scheme is overwhelming. I look round the country and see demonstrations against bypasses here, there and everywhere. The Department has had great difficulty getting those roads built, whereas in Cheadle we have wanted this road for 30 years. No one is against it, yet we cannot have it. I wish that hon. Members who have problems with bypasses in their constituencies would write to the Minister and say, "Let Mr. Day in Cheadle have the money for the bypass up there." We would take the money with both hands and say, "Get on and build the MAELR."

We need an early starting date. We lost the original starting date. We were told at the public inquiry that there would be a four-year gap between the building of the central section and the building of the western and eastern sections. I am now told by the Highways Agency that we could be looking at 2006. That is not acceptable, and am sure that my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield agrees. My constituents are furious, and I do not blame them—I share their anger. Something must be done to fulfil the promises made at the public inquiry.

Surely the Minister is now in no doubt about the overwhelming importance of the scheme to my constituency and the area beyond. We have waited 30 years, so please let us have our road. My constituents have waited far too long. They now have problems because only the central section is being built, whereas the whole scheme should have been built.

The people of Heald Green, Bramhall and Woodford—I leave it to my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield to mention places in his constituency—are looking to the Minister to provide the relief that they have waited 30 years for. We desperately need that relief, because the traffic congestion is appalling. My constituents have a right to expect the Government to act; I expect nothing else, and neither do they.

4.59 pm
Mr. Nicholas Winterton (Macclesfield)

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle (Mr. Day) for allowing me to speak in his Adjournment debate. As he implied, the road projects about which he spoke so well and so accurately impact upon my constituency as much as on his. I endorse to the letter, to the word and to the dot, everything that he said to the Minister, through the Minister to the Secretary of State for Transport and through the Secretary of State to the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Earlier today, I asked the Chancellor a supplementary question highlighting the importance of infrastructure expenditure and investment to the prosperous and progressive economy, and he agreed that such investment was vital to the on-going progress of the United Kingdom economy.

I am here to represent the interests of the people of Poynton, of the village of Newton and of the large village of Prestbury. All those areas are suffering immensely because of the A34(M) Handforth-Wilmslow bypass and the Department of Transport's failure to proceed with the construction of the MAELR east and west.

I have bombarded the Secretary of State and the Minister with letters. I recently had a letter from the county engineer of Cheshire county council, Mr. Peter Cocker. He says: I refer to your letters of 1 I, 14, 15, 16 and 18 October 1996". With those letters to Mr. Cocker, I enclosed numerous letters from constituents, mainly—not exclusively—from people who live on or near the Chester road in Poynton.

Their environment has been dramatically disadvantaged, undermined and damaged since the opening of the centre section of what I would call the MAELR contract project road-that is, the Handforth-Wilmslow bypass, the A34(M).

Mr. Cocker's letter continues: Most of your constituents have highlighted the need for the Poynton By-Pass" — my hon. Friend the Minister will be aware that that is part of the MAELR contract— and I can only reiterate the County Council's support for this scheme. The by-pass, and the western MAELR Link, represents the only real means of resolving the local problems to which I had referred. Mr. Cocker then makes an important point; he says: These schemes are part of the Department of Transport's Trunk Road programme. We are not pushing something that is not part of the Department's programme.

The letter continues: The Department of Transport supported the Wilmslow/Handforth/MAELR schemes through their Public Inquiry process, indicating"— this is a critical point— a programme for an early completion of the MAELR/Poynton By-Pass scheme in evidence at the inquiry." Was that fraudulent? Was that dishonest? Did the Department mean what it said? If so, it must proceed with the scheme. Perhaps the inspector found as he did because the road would be part of a wider trunk road building programme.

The county engineer goes on to say: The element of the MAELR scheme which was considered at the Inquiry (and now completed) forms a part of the protected Trunk Road link between the A6(M) scheme and the M56 spur at Manchester Airport. The failure to carry forward these schemes on a timetable which was specifically put before the Inspector at the public inquiry by the DOT is giving rise to the current problems in this area. My hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle referred several times to that matter, and I fully support what he said. Perhaps Mr. Cocker put it even more succinctly.

The Department of Transport owes this road to my hon. Friend and me, as well as to my hon. Friends the Members for Hazel Grove (Sir T. Arnold) and for Altrincham and Sale (Sir F. Montgomery) and to the right hon. Member for Manchester, Wythenshawe (Mr. Morris), to minimise the unacceptable congestion in our areas which is damaging the environment and adversely affecting the quality of life of those people whom we represent.

My hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle mentioned the public inquiry, which I believe has almost finished, into the application by coal contractors for opencast coal mining at Towers farm in Poynton in my constituency. Uniquely, for the first time in 25 years, I appeared personally to object and to oppose the application. I was delighted that my hon. Friend also found time right at the end of the recess to appear and give evidence.

My evidence related to a range of reasons why the appeal should not succeed and my hon. Friend, representing the best interests of all his constituents, highlighted the existing road problems, which could only be exacerbated. I hope that I am not out of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker, if I express the fervent hope, based on facts and on democratic representation, that when the report comes before my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment, he will see that there is overwhelming opposition to the opencast application. I hope that the inspector's conclusions will be the same, that the Secretary of State will support them, and that the appeal will be dismissed.

My hon. Friend the Minister knows the beautiful village of Prestbury. Peter Hayes, a well-known local business man, was elected to the council in May this year. His time has been dominated since then by the representations of hundreds of local people on the matter of the road chaos caused in Prestbury by the opening of the Handforth-Wilmslow bypass and by the huge increase in the volume of traffic flowing through the village, with all the environmental and road safety implications that go with it.

Prestbury parish council feels so strongly that it has set up a special highways road sub-committee, to which it has co-opted people who do not even sit on the parish council—I refer in particular to a Mrs. Lillian Burns, who is becoming an expert on roads and who is doing a great deal of work in close co-operation with Councillor Peter Hayes. Sadly, a past mayor who was the second councillor for Prestbury and Adlington, died recently. The new councillor is Mr. John Braithwaite, another local business man; a great deal of his time is spent dealing with fair and reasonable representations from people who are appalled by what is going on. Because the road schemes have been postponed, people's life style, quality of life and environment have been badly disadvantaged.

I know that my hon. Friend does his best as Minister for Railways and Roads, and I ask him to listen to the concerns of both Conservative and Opposition Members. I do not think that I am being selfish: the areas of my constituency to which I have referred—Prestbury, Mottram St. Andrew, Newton, Adlington and Poynton—contribute massively to the income of the county council, by way of domestic rates, and to that of the Government by way of the business rate and taxation.

My hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle referred to some very desirable residential areas of his constituency. Do we want to destroy the environment of those areas? Do we want to deny those who live there—who make a great contribution to the economy through their work and through the taxes, the domestic rates and the business rates that they pay—some return on all that money? The Department of Transport recognises the importance of the roads.

I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Minister. He has been to my constituency and has gone round with me to see the sites of some of the road projects that are required. We hear of the huge sums of public money wasted on security for the construction of the Newbury bypass and of the strong opposition to the Salisbury bypass. The people of the area of Cheshire that I represent would love to have roads built. They want to put civil engineers back to work and they want to help the environment. The roads are well designed and some are fairly advanced in the contract procedures. The designs are finalised. The public inquiries may be still to be held in some cases, but a great deal of work and money has been invested. How much money have the Government had to fork out on security for the Newbury bypass? I suspect that a large part—

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Morris)

Order. The hon. Gentleman could table a question about that if he was so minded. This has nothing to do with the Manchester link bypass, which is the subject on which he has been given permission to make a contribution.

Mr. Winterton

I am grateful to you, Mr, Deputy Speaker. However, the money spent on security at Newbury could have been spent on the Poynton bypass, for which my hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle and I are making a plea to our hon. Friend the Minister. We want an assurance that the A523 Macclesfield-Poynton road improvement scheme, which ties up with the Poynton bypass and is part of the MAELR east and west, will remain a priority in the Government's trunk road construction programme. We are not asking him to say that the project will go ahead within two years, although I would love him to say that. If he did, he could come to my constituency and drink champagne from dawn until dusk at my expense.

The roads are vital. All the elected councils want them: Cheshire county council; Macclesfield borough council; Poynton parish council; Adlington parish council; Mottram parish council; and Prestbury parish council. The Members of Parliament representing the areas concerned also want the roads. My hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle spoke with great eloquence for his constituency and its councils. I hope that I have added to his argument.

My hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle and I have slightly different views on the airport. I am in favour of the second runway because of its economic importance to the north-west. However, that aside, the airport company believes that if the runway plan is to go ahead, the MAELR projects are essential, although the company hopes that a great deal of the stone that will come to the airport for the second runway will be transported by rail, subject to a freight support grant from the Department of Transport.

If a buoyant area of the country is to continue to play its role in the economy of the north-west and of the United Kingdom, I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will appreciate the sincerity with which our arguments have been advanced and will at least go some way towards giving us the reassurances that we have asked for. Surely the views of the public are important in a democracy. The majority of people in the area are in favour. I hope that that carries weight in the House and with the Government.

5.13 pm
The Minister for Railways and Roads (Mr. John Watts)

First, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle (Mr. Day) on his success in obtaining parliamentary time to debate an issue on which he has been campaigning tirelessly on behalf of his constituents. I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (Mr. Winterton) on his efforts. Both my hon. Friends have spoken not just on their own behalf, but for many other right hon. and hon. Members. My hon. Friends' constituents are fortunate, or perhaps wise, to have chosen such powerful advocates of their interests.

I know very well that the delay in the provision of MAELR is a matter of considerable concern to local residents, particularly those who live on Woodford road and Chester road, where traffic flows have increased substantially following the construction of the central section of MAELR by Cheshire county council. I am glad to have the opportunity to respond to those concerns. Indeed, my hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle showed the House an impressive bundle of letters. I suspect that it included a substantial number of replies from me, because I find probably two or three such letters in my box every night, which I read and sign on my way home.

On the petition to which my hon. Friend referred, I cannot guarantee now that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will be able to meet his constituents to receive it. I am sure, however, that, if there is time available in his diary, he would be prepared to meet them. I can give my hon. Friend the assurance that, if he cannot do so, I shall certainly be willing to meet his constituents again and receive their petition.

It is relevant to consider the background to the scheme, although my hon. Friends the Members for Cheadle and Macclesfield have filled in a great deal of its history. It is a fact that, as long ago as the 1950s, a route for an east-west link between Hazel Grove and Manchester airport has been protected against development by local authorities.

In 1989, the national importance of the scheme was recognised, when it was added to the trunk road programme. The scheme was then entitled the "A6(M) to M56 (Manchester Airport) Link", and was expected to follow broadly the route protected by the three local authorities whose boundaries were crossed—Cheshire county council, Stockport metropolitan borough council and Manchester city council.

The purpose of the scheme was, and is, to provide improved access to a thriving and expanding airport from the south and east, and to provide relief to congested roads across the southern fringes of the Manchester conurbation. It is an important part of the infrastructure that is needed to serve Manchester airport, which is becoming one of the nation's most important airports, and certainly the most important of the regional airports.

I must not allow myself to be drawn into commenting on the merits or demerits of the plans to expand the airport because they are subject to public inquiry and, ultimately, a quasi-judicial decision by my right hon. Friends. It is clear, however, that even given its current development, the airport would benefit significantly from improved infrastructure. That, in turn, would offer an additional economic benefit to an important region of the United Kingdom.

Following the addition of the scheme to the trunk road programme, the route protection was taken over by my Department. The scheme was then split into three sections. The eastern section from Hazel Grove to Woodford is included in the proposals for the A555-A523 Poynton bypass, for which there is a preferred route following a public consultation held six years ago. The western section, which links with the M56 at the airport and extends to the A34 at Handforth, also has a preferred route following public consultation held in the summer of 1993.

As my hon. Friends have already said, the central section has already been built and the immediate effects of its provision are the cause of concern, or at least the increased concern of my hon. Friends and their constituents.

I apologise for going over ground with which I know my hon. Friends are extremely familiar, but it is important to make clear the sequence of events that have led to the current situation. That is particularly important in relation to the central section, which was built by the county council as part of its scheme to provide a north-south bypass of the A34 through Handforth and Wilmslow.

The Handforth section, and the central section of MAELR has now been open for just over 12 months, and I understand that the Wilmslow section is due for completion in December.

As my hon. Friends are aware, the availability of private finance from major store developments enabled Cheshire county council to proceed with its scheme. It may be now viewed as a mixed blessing. On the one hand, one is aware of the advantages of seizing the opportunities of the availability of private finance to provide a road that would otherwise have had to be provided at some time wholly at public expense, but the advancement of the phasing of the construction that it permitted, and my Department's inability to put the other two pieces in place at the same time, have created the problems that my hon. Friends eloquently described.

Mr. Day

Yes, it is a mixed blessing, but it becomes a blessing if we get the rest of the road. The ultimate disaster would be for us to be left with only the central section. That would be worse than no road being built at all. The fact that the central section is there makes the rest essential.

Mr. Watts

I take my hon. Friend's point absolutely.

Regarding the central section, my Department's involvement was to meet the cost of upgrading the carriageway provision of the central section of MAELR only from single lane to dual two lane and to provide grade separation at the junction, in order to meet the future requirements of traffic forecast to use the completed MAELR between the airport and Hazel Grove. We made no direct contribution to the main component of the scheme other than an element of transport supplementary grant, which is a feature of all major local authority roads.

Both my hon. Friends have ensured that I have been made aware of the effects of traffic using the completed section, almost from the day that the road opened. My hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle extended to me a very warm welcome to visit his constituency just before or just after the Conservative party conference last year, and I had the opportunity then to see the problems. My hon. Friend drove me around the area—fairly slowly, because of the amount of traffic—and I had the opportunity to meet many of his constituents and their local representatives.

I saw the validity of the concerns of residents of Woodford and Poynton, and especially of those living on the Chester road and the Woodford road. They are worried about increases in traffic, type of traffic, pedestrian safety and effects of traffic in the form of noise and other nuisance.

There appear to be three main causes of that concern. First, the opening of the central section has led to a redistribution of traffic movements on the local road network. Secondly, the opening of the prestigious and large scale shopping developments at Cheadle and Handforth Dean has led to increases in traffic on many local roads, including key routes in Poynton. Thirdly, there are at present major works by statutory undertakers on the A6 in Stockport and Hazel grove, which are causing severe congestion and resulting in drivers seeking alternative routes. Some of that traffic will add to pressure on local roads in the area, but, fortunately, that third element should be only a temporary problem.

I am well aware that a local campaign has been formed to press for the completion of the airport link road. On a positive note, both the western section of MAELR and the Poynton bypass remain firmly in the main programme following the extremely stringent review that I had to undertake last year, which concluded in the publication of the revised road programme last November. It is obvious why those schemes have remained in the main programme. They have done so for the reasons that my hon. Friends have so eloquently explained. Those roads are of great value in helping to resolve local problems, are significant for the region and would form part of the linkage to the airport, which is important for the north-western region.

However, my hon. Friends appreciate that the Government are determined to maintain public spending at levels that my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor believes can be afforded, and the transport budget, with others, has had to be set at a level commensurate with the total sum. In the past two spending rounds, my trunk road budget lost more than £1 billion, making the programme more difficult to manage.

I assure my hon. Friends that I understand their eagerness for progress. The schemes will be implemented as soon as resources can be made available.

I understand the feeling that the possibility of private money should be considered. The Government have very successfully promoted the private finance initiative in the roads programme. In line with that policy, if there is a possibility of private funding contributing toward the earlier completion of these schemes, we shall always be happy to speak—

Mr. Winterton

My hon. Friend the Minister heard what my hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle said. I also took up, in a modest way, the issue of the airport's role, and I know that the airport management would be happy to co-operate with any initiative that could speed up the road's construction. I suggest that the Department of Transport talks to the airport management, because I suspect that that might involve financial assistance on a modest scale, which could be part of the private finance initiative that my hon. Friend mentioned.

Mr. Watts

I would be happy to pursue any such possibility, but, although I would not necessarily expect offers of private funding to cover the whole scheme—that would be very ambitious—any private sector contribution would need to be fairly significant to have a significant effect on the rate of delivery.

Following my visit to Cheadle, I asked the Highways Agency to investigate the possibility, suggested by the Woodford Community Council, that part of the eastern section of MAELR between Woodford road and Chester road should be constructed before the remainder of the road, to provide relief to those local roads. That suggestion was considered very carefully, but unfortunately we had to conclude that we could not go ahead with temporary measures of that type because there would have been abortive costs. We would have ended up building sections of roadway that would not form part of the ultimate trunk road scheme, and we could not justify using trunk road money for what would have been only a local traffic alleviation in the longer term.

I understand that Cheshire county council is to undertake traffic survey work in that area, with special emphasis on the A5149 Chester road. However, my hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle will be aware that my direct responsibilities are limited to the trunk road network. The Chester road forms part of the local road network, for which the local Highway Authority is responsible, and as such it would be for the county council to determine, in the light of its survey work, what measures it may believe that it is appropriate to pursue. I am not in a position to give it any instructions as to what it should do.

Priorities have had to be set within a realistic and fairly tight framework. I hope that we have done so responsibly, concentrating our efforts on key national routes. It would not have been realistic to try to progress each and every scheme in the main programme at the same time, and we would have consumed resources in preparation work at the expense of having money to start construction.

I assure both my hon. Friends and those other right hon. and hon. Members on whose behalf they spoke today that the needs of their constituents have not been forgotten, and that we shall continue to invest sensibly and carefully to meet the transport needs of this area, as elsewhere. My hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield spoke of the timetable that was outlined at public inquiry. I do not believe that my officials were behaving fraudulently or dishonestly in what they said in their evidence to the inquiry, but the significance of timing is that that inquiry took place before we had had more than £1 billion removed from our trunk road budget. I was therefore pleased to hear that my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield was able to ask my right hon. and learned Friend the Chancellor about the importance of infrastructure maintaining a buoyant economy arid received a satisfactory reply from my right hon. arid learned Friend, which is no less than we would ever expect of him.

Mr. Day

I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will not forget a major point that I asked him to respond to. He may have been coming to it, but I wish to be certain. It concerns Woodford road junction returning to its original design: the junction being closed and done away with, and the road going under Woodford road as originally proposed. That is very important to my constituents.

Mr. Watts

It would ultimately be a matter for the local highway authority to decide whether it wished to maintain the junction as part of its local network. Once we are in a position to complete our trunk road scheme, it would be odd if an unnecessary part of the network were maintained.

Mr. Day

At the public inquiry into the MAELR, my constituents on Woodford road were assured that the junction created there would be temporary. Temporary means that it will be removed. My constituents are not being unreasonable to think that the promise made at a public inquiry should be honoured. They were promised at the public inquiry that, once the road was completed, the junction would disappear; anything else would be to let them down and to have misled them in a way which I am sure my hon. Friend would not wish to be guilty of.

Mr. Watts

Any undertaking given at a public inquiry by my officials on my behalf will be honoured, and I expect that any undertaking given by Cheshire county council will be similarly honoured.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at half-past Five o'clock.