Source · Select Committees · Public Accounts Committee
Recommendation 5
5
Accepted
Evaluate local road funding approaches and PFI schemes to inform future effectiveness.
Conclusion
The Department has not evaluated its approaches to funding local roads to know whether they are delivering value for money. Despite providing over £1 billion of funding each year to local authorities for the maintenance of local roads, the Department has not evaluated the totality of funding it has made available and what it has achieved from this. It has evaluated one of the 12 funding pots it has used over the last decade. In particular, it has not evaluated its fund which used incentives to improve local authorities’ asset management practices, despite issues identified in the NAO report and its plans to use such an approach going forward. The Department has also not evaluated the effectiveness of funding of local road maintenance through Private Finance Initiatives (PFIs). recommendation The Department should evaluate approaches to funding local roads to determine what has been effective to help inform future approaches. This should include conducting interim evaluations on local authority PFI schemes.
Government Response Summary
The government agrees and commits to commissioning a feasibility study in 2025 to understand the evidence base for local roads funding evaluations. Following this, a monitoring and evaluation framework will be developed for operation in 2026 to generate regular reports on the effectiveness and impact of capital funding support for local highways authorities.
Government Response
Accepted
HM Government
Accepted
The government agrees with the Committee’s recommendation. framework, the department plans to commission a feasibility study in 2025 to understand the current state of evidence, evidence gaps and data collection mechanisms in local authorities. This will then help scope evaluation questions and identify appropriate approaches for monitoring and evaluating the department’s local highways maintenance funding. Following the completion of the feasibility study and dependent on its recommendations, a monitoring and evaluation framework will be developed for operation in 2026, with the aim of generating regular evaluation reports, to help understand the effectiveness and impact of the department’s capital funding support for local highways authorities. A key part of the monitoring and evaluation framework will be to utilise national data collection mechanisms to understand the effects of the funding on road condition. This could include, for example, data on local roads maintenance gathered through the new Integrated Settlement outcomes framework for Mayoral Combined Authorities. It could also utilise any other data shared by local highways authorities to access their full funding in financial year 2025-26, part of which is being held back until local authorities can prove that they are meeting certain criteria. The department will engage with the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local government during the design and delivery of the evaluation given their responsibility for the overall funding system for local government.