§ 3. Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham)If he will make a statement on his practice in relation to meeting delegations from Worthing and Adur to discuss the need for a bypass around Worthing and Lancing. [119404]
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Mr. David Jamieson)We have recently revisited our policy of meeting delegations while considering multi-modal study recommendations. Where there are issues of particular significance, we have decided that we should listen to the views of delegations.
§ Tim LoughtonI am pleased to hear it. As the Minister well knows, the thorny problem of the Worthing bypass stretches back about 30 years, and congestion on the A27, exacerbated by the further house building being forced on the area, is acting as a brake on business investment. Why is it, therefore, that he refused to see a delegation from the West Sussex economic forum earlier in the year, and that in April he refused to see a delegation of local businesses headed by me and my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing, West (Peter Bottomley), yet recently he has apparently seen delegations from a number of environmental groups opposed to any road building in the area? Is not that double standards, and will he agree to meet proper delegations, representative of Worthing and the desperate need for a bypass in our area?
§ Mr. JamiesonThe hon. Gentleman knows that I am not unwilling to meet him, because I did so last year on another matter related to his constituency. Our view was that such meetings could have led to some frustration; as he will appreciate, Ministers are somewhat constrained on such occasions because we could not hold discussions 194 that were seen to pre-empt the Government's formal response to any study. If he will accept that during such meetings Ministers would be very much in listening mode, I should be happy to meet a delegation and to hear his views about the bypass for Worthing and Lancing, the merits of which were certainly never recognised by previous Conservative Governments.