The UK government’s latest Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR) was presented as a roadmap to a more productive, inclusive, and resilient Britain. It promised economic growth, levelling up, and improved public services. But one essential ingredient, transport, was left undernourished.
Transport is not a background issue. It is central to the economic and social fabric of the nation. It is how people access opportunity. It is what makes jobs viable, care accessible, homes deliverable, and communities resilient. Without sustained, systemic investment in transport, especially at local and regional levels, those flagship ambitions risk resting on shallow foundations.
This is especially critical in the context of the forthcoming National Industrial Strategy and Infrastructure Plan, expected within the next two weeks. If that strategy is to be credible, it must recognise what the CSR failed to grasp: that transport infrastructure is not just an enabler of growth; it is growth. Without proper connectivity, the pillars of industrial strategy – skills, innovation, supply chains, and net zero – will not hold. The infrastructure plan must learn from the CSR’s omissions and deliver a genuinely integrated investment framework that aligns national goals with local delivery.
Across the country, Combined Authorities and their partners have already laid the groundwork. Leaders have developed detailed and evidence-based plans, with Authorities like Greater Manchester and the West Midlands having shown what is possible when local plans are properly backed. My own Authority’s Local Transport and Connectivity Plan (LTCP) integrates transport with housing, skills, health, and economic development. The LTCP is a mature, ambitious blueprint for inclusive, green growth. It is rooted in local need and national purpose. But in the absence of predictable, devolved funding, these strategies remain aspirational rather than transformational.
The disconnect is glaring. Major projects like the Ely Area Capacity Enhancement scheme that would unlock rail bottlenecks, boost national freight capacity, and enable faster passenger services between Cambridge, Norwich, Ipswich and beyond, continue to stall due to lack of funding clarity. This is not just a regional rail scheme; it is a national productivity initiative. Similarly, key roads, vital for accessing housing and jobs, remain constrained by outdated single carriageways, creating congestion, emissions, and safety issues. Therefore, the case for dualling some roads is well evidenced, but CSR allocations once again favoured short-term headline projects over strategic regional infrastructure.
The underinvestment is particularly acute in regions like the East of England and the South West – areas that are too often overlooked in national funding decisions despite their economic potential. Both regions face serious connectivity challenges: sparse rural networks, underfunded local bus systems, and stalled rail improvements. In the South West, vital schemes to improve resilience on routes like the A303 and rail lines vulnerable to coastal erosion remain unfunded or delayed. In the East, the combination of high growth and inadequate infrastructure is already creating constraints on housing, labour markets, and decarbonisation. If levelling up is to mean anything, it must apply to these ‘left-out’ regions, not just the traditionally defined ‘left behind’ areas.
This pattern is repeated in the underinvestment in local transport systems, buses, active travel, demand-responsive transport, all of which are essential for reducing car dependency and improving access for all. In my Authority’s own LTCP, the Huntingdonshire Transport Strategy exemplifies how a carefully integrated local approach can unlock housing, employment, and net zero goals simultaneously. Yet without long-term funding, even the most robust plans remain plans on paper.
All of this matters even more in light of the government’s wider commitments. The National Industrial Strategy, is expected to focus on digital transformation, clean growth, advanced manufacturing, and life sciences. These are high-value, high-productivity sectors, but they all depend on functional, reliable transport networks. A biotech hub is worthless if its workforce can’t reach it. A new research park fails without connections to housing, skills pipelines, and public transport. If transport is omitted or deprioritised in the coming infrastructure plan, then the strategy risks collapsing under the weight of its own contradictions.
There is also the question of devolution. The CSR’s failure to embed a truly devolved approach to transport funding is out of step with the Government’s own rhetoric. Devolution is not about postcode lotteries or localism for its own sake; it is about enabling place-based policy that can respond flexibly to local challenges and opportunities. Combined Authorities were created to deliver this integrated thinking. Yet they remain hamstrung by fragmented funding pots, ad hoc bidding processes, and centralised control.
In health, the impact is profound. Our NHS is under enormous strain, and transport is a critical yet overlooked factor. Missed appointments, delayed discharges, and difficulties recruiting staff are all exacerbated by poor transport. In rural areas, patients frequently cite mobility issues as a barrier to care. In cities, shift workers struggle with unreliable services. Local Transport Plans should align directly with Integrated Care Systems to address these issues, proposing solutions like shift-friendly bus services and mobility hubs at health centres. But again, strategy without funding is a hollow promise.
And lets not forget prevention. Transport is not just about access; it is about activity. Active travel infrastructure helps reduce obesity, improve mental health, and lower the long-term burden on health services. Yet the CSR failed to scale investment in walking and cycling to anywhere near the levels seen in the Netherlands or Denmark. This is not just a missed opportunity, it is a costly failure of policy imagination.
We need a new model, one that aligns central ambitions with local delivery capacity. That means funding LTPs as core national infrastructure; prioritising schemes like Ely Junction and key road dualling as enablers of industrial strategy; embedding transport into the National Infrastructure Plan as a cross-cutting investment, not a sectoral line item; and giving Combined Authorities the autonomy and resources to lead.
Crucially, this is not about choosing between buses or broadband, roads or rail, homes or hospitals. It is about recognising that all of these things depend on one another. You cannot build thriving places without connected infrastructure. The CSR ignored that reality. The Infrastructure Plan must not.
In conclusion, the government now has a clear opportunity to reset its approach. The forthcoming National Industrial Strategy and Infrastructure Plan must succeed where the CSR fell short—by prioritising investment in the everyday systems that connect people to jobs, education, and services. Transport must sit at the heart of that agenda. Without it, levelling up risks losing momentum, net zero goals will slip further from reach, and the promise of national growth will remain unrealised.
We have the plans. We have the public support. What we need now is political will—and the funding framework to match.
This all leads to a bigger question: what kind of country are we trying to build?
This is not a choice between roads or rail, buses or broadband, homes or hospitals. It is about the connections between them. Without that, strategies fail, and public trust erodes. As the government prepares to launch its new industrial strategy and infrastructure plan, it faces a moment of truth:
- Will it invest in the everyday systems that make prosperity possible?
- Will it treat all regions equally—not just rhetorically, but financially?
- Will it give local leaders the tools to deliver change, or continue to bind them with bureaucracy and bidding wars?
- Will it build a joined-up nation, or continue to rely on fragmented fixes?
We have the evidence. We have the ambition. And we have the public mandate. Now we need the Government to answer the most important question of all: if not now, when?
Tim Bellamy is Assistant Director – Transport at Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority
Tim originally published this article on LinkedIn on 19th June 2025
Feature Image Source: Freepik