Transport Insights

A new report from the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority (NISTA) has shown how the Department for Transport is playing fast and loose with public money over the Lower Thames Crossing (LTC) – and basically lying to avoid releasing the mega-project’s business case.

Highways magazine reports that, in terms of NISTA’s Delivery Confidence Assessment in its Annual Report 2025/2026:

None of the Department for Transport’s (DfT) highways projects were rated red; however, the £10bn Lower Thames Crossing and the £1.5bn A66 Northern Trans-Pennine scheme did slip into amber.

But, as Highways notes, the LTC’s Senior Responsible Owner (the DfT’s Kate Cohen) decided that the project should be bumped up to a green rating.

Her commentary on its DCA states:

Compared to financial year 24/25 Q4, the SRO Delivery Confidence Assessment (DCA) rating at 25/26 Q4 improved from Amber to Green.
[…]
The NISTA DCA rating for 25/26 Q4 is Amber, whilst we recognise that there are still risks to delivery, the SRO is content that sufficient mitigations were in place as of March-26 and therefore rated the DCA as Green. The project DCA is reviewed monthly. The Outline Business Case was updated and approved by the DfT Investment Committee in October 2025. This marks the transition from full public sector funding to a future private sector RAB model, with the private sector to deliver the remainder of the scheme and take on Dartford Crossing operations in 2028.

The statement that the private sector operator will take on Dartford Crossing operations – and revenue – in 2028, as it starts construction, is the first time that this has been stated explicitly.

It means that the state will be putting in (even more) public funding from the outset, again giving the lie to the claim that this is privately financed.

And this also (again) gives the lie to the DfT’s claim that outline business case that it has refused to release is in “draft form”.

As I noted previously:

The DfT has turned down a request from Transport Action Network’s (TAN) Becca Lush for the OBC to be disclosed under the Environmental Information Regulations (EIR) on the grounds (inter alia) that “this information is draft and the outline business case has not been finalised”.

But the confirmation (again) that “The Outline Business Case was updated and approved by the DfT Investment Committee in October 2025” means that this is wholly untrue. Approval by the investment committee means the business case has been fully adopted – and acted on. The committee does not do this with draft business cases.

We’re in make believe territory with the LTC these days, with the soon-to-be-ex chancellor and the soon-to-be-ex transport secretary driving the scheme through for ideological reasons.

It’s Schrödinger’s road scheme and Schrödinger’s business case. Simultaneously amber and green, simultaneously publicly financed and privately financed, and simultaneously draft and approved.

Surely the National Audit Office, which has undertaken to review the scheme – but not yet – must be asking, if the DfT has to play these kinds of games, how strong is the case for the project?