All five road safety schemes that National Highways actually delivered under its “enhanced safety plan” for the last year of the second roads period fell under an existing safety programme, with no evidence that they were “beyond its previously planned activities”, as required by the company’s regulator.
But the Office of Rail and Road (ORR), which demanded that the company produce the “enhanced plan” to address its poor casualty reduction record, failed to carry out any checks to ensure the actions were genuinely additional.
In fact, both the company and the regulator have insisted (without evidence) that the actions in the enhanced safety plan, which was given to the ORR in March 2024, were “additional” to National Highways’ 2024-25 Delivery Plan Update, which was not published until this March and does not list specific activities.
National Highways appears to have actually cut the funding available for safety improvements at the end of the whole 2020-25 roads period, including the year covered by the plan.
The disclosure casts further doubt on the competence of the ORR and its willingness to hold National Highways to account, as it claims to do, after it refused to publish the plan but praised the company for “doing everything it reasonably can” to address its failing safety record.
Transport Insights 