Tim Roca

I beg to move, That this House has considered the impact of roadworks on communities in Cheshire. It is a privilege to serve under your chairship, Sir Desmond. I am grateful to you and to the House for granting me this opportunity at short notice. I particularly thank the Minister for being here as well; I know that she has an incredibly busy schedule as well as a terrible inheritance from the previous Government, which she is trying to fix. In my constituency of Macclesfield and elsewhere in Cheshire, we rely on our road network day in, day out, and it should be stable, dependable and free flowing. Over the past year, that network has become a source of constant frustration: what should be routine journeys have turned into a daily ordeal and a monotonous misery. Week in and week out, I find myself fighting to get basic roadworks resolved. I cannot quite believe that one year on in one place and six months on in another, the works are still unresolved—one year of disruption, one year of misery. That is what brings me here today. The two specific cases I want to highlight are the closure of the B5470 in Rainow and the traffic lights at the A523 Mill House bridge in Adlington. The Mill House bridge sits on the A523, which is the main road in and out of Macclesfield. It is regularly used by people heading to Manchester, Poynton, Adlington and the north—or pretty much anywhere, including Leek and Stoke to the south. The importance of that road simply cannot be overstated to residents across swathes of Cheshire. A full year ago, part of the bridge collapsed, meaning that two-way traffic was unsafe. The council acted properly, putting in place temporary traffic lights to restrict the flow of traffic to one lane at a time. Since then, to be frank, insufficient progress has been made by Ringway Jacobs, the main contractor for the council. When it comes to the delays, it has talked about the complexity of a nearby gas main and confusion over who is responsible for part of the repair. But the delays are simply unacceptable. In January, works beneath the bridge finally began, after much urging from me, but that was eight months after the traffic lights had been installed. Those works are scheduled to be completed in early summer, which basically begins next week. I probably do not need to tell you, Sir Desmond, that confidence among my constituents that the issue will be resolved in a few weeks’ time is very low because too little has happened too slowly and with insufficient communication. Expected completion dates keep getting pushed back and back with no accountability, sincere apology or explanation.