§ Mr. Fitchasked the Secretary of State for Transport whether he has yet formed a view about the desirability of switching some trunk road resources to local roads as foreshadowed in paragraph 69 of the White Paper "Policy for Roads: England 1978", Command Paper No. 7132.
§ Mr. William RodgersNot yet. The discussions with the local authority associations promised in Cmnd 7132 have demonstrated the difficulties, brought out in the report of the Leitch Committee, of devising a basis of appraisal for road schemes which is generally acceptable. As Cmnd 7132 points out, schemes in urban areas, which constitute a high proportion of local road schemes, present a particular problem because additional weight needs to be given to a variety of noneconomic factors. More work, both on collecting more detailed information on 645W a national basis about the local road schemes likely to be proposed in future and on devising a basis for comparing the merits of local road schemes with trunk road schemes, is therefore underway in conjunction with the local authority associations. It will be some time before I can form a view about the justification for, and extent of, a transfer of resources, but I remain very willing to make such a switch if it proves desirable.