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Former transport chief warns of “parochialism” |
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Tuesday, 25 March 2008 |
A former chief executive of the Strathclyde Passenger Transport Executive has warned that “parochialism” could affect the work of regional transport partnerships after their capital funding was transferred from central to local government, and not ring-fenced, as part of the Government’s Concordat with local government.
Stephen Lockley, the director general of Strathclyde Passenger
Transport Executive from 1986 to 1997, and now chairman of the Scottish
Policy Group of the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport, has
said that his experience when Strathclyde Regional Council was
abolished in the local government reorganisation of 1996 was that
capital funding could “vanish”.
“We were left trying to get all the capital funding directly from all
the successor local authorities, which was extremely difficult, to put
it mildly,” he said.
Regional transport partnerships will now have to source capital funding
from their constituent local authorities, and Lockley said: “When you
come to capital funding, naturally all the local authorities have much
more control of their funding streams, rather than put something into a
central capital pot which could well go on a capital project that isn’t
in that authority.”
He quotes the example of plans to reopen the Larkhall railway line in
the 1990s, which ran into funding difficulties after “the whole system
of having a regional council with a substantial amount of capital
funding which we then made a play for internally vanished”.
“If you’re one of the Ayrshire authorities, you’re not that keen on it
compared to new schools or whatever in Ayrshire, to pay for a new
railway line in South Lanarkshire, and so you couldn’t blame the
authorities for being very wary of capital finance schemes. But in
Strathclyde when you had an overall regional authority, just like the
Lothians, this sort of parochialism was nothing like as much to the
fore because there was a collective strategic decision.
“The regional transport partnerships have the same dilemma. Unless they
get money being sent to it, it can’t do anything. I welcomed the
regional transport partnerships as a part way to get back what was lost
when the regional councils went, but I said, and many people like me
said, that unless they have direct capital grants from [the] centre and
have specific capital expenditure allowances, they’re going to be
frustrated so much that it’s going to become extremely difficult, and
that’s how it’s turned out.”
A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “Regional transport
partnerships have always worked closely with local authorities on
identifying local priorities for investment and we expect that
constructive relationship to continue.
“Through the recent historic deal with COSLA, local authorities will be
receiving record levels of funding to spend on local priorities. More
money than ever before and reduced ring fencing gives local authorities
and RTPs an opportunity like never before to deliver the improvements
demanded and expected by the communities they represent.”
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Last Updated ( Tuesday, 25 March 2008 )
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Holyrood magazine 
