A project that escaped scrutiny by the Welsh Roads Review Panel after the UK Government awarded funding does not provide a model to bypass the Welsh Government’s radical new roads policy, a minister has said.
The Labour-controlled Rhondda Cynon Taf County Borough Council obtained £11.4m from the UK Government’s Levelling Up Fund for the A4119 Coed Ely to Llantrisant Business Park dualling.
The Labour-run Welsh Government then allowed the scheme to be omitted from scrutiny under the roads review, despite the fact that the review was primarily established 'to reduce Wales’ carbon footprint to protect people and wildlife from the climate emergency'.
Highways asked Lee Waters, the Welsh deputy climate change minister if other authorities could implement non-compliant roads by winning UK funding.
'That’s absolutely not the message,' he replied. 'This is now Welsh transport policy, so if it [a scheme with funding from elsewhere] was challenged at public inquiry, they would still have to judge themselves against Welsh transport policy, which they wouldn’t be able to [meet] with these sorts of schemes.'
He said contracts had been let for the A4119 dualling when it was exempted from the review: 'It was so advanced that to have pulled back at that stage, when no further funding was required from Welsh local government, the CPOs had all been dealt with by the local authority, that it seems churlish to try and stop that development from going ahead.'
In 2021, the Welsh Government paused all current road schemes that had not reached construction while the independent roads review panel checked whether they aligned with current policies, particularly on climate change.
After the UK Government awarded funding, the Welsh Government removed the A4119 project from the review. Construction began last August.
The Welsh Government has now accepted the panel’s recommendation that projects should not increase road capacity.
The first project cancelled as a result of the panel’s work was the A496 Llanbedr bypass, the subject of a fast-tracked report from the panel in 2021. Last year Gwynedd Council said it would seek up to £40m from the Levelling Up Fund for a Llanbedr bypass.
