It can be a nightmare trying to come up with a reliable and consistent number for how much money is spent by government on managing, maintaining and building roads. We were asked the question again today. Our answer – £9.4 billion – came from one of the tables in the Transport Statistics GB series (which was last updated in November 2011). Of course this does not provide the full breakdown of to whom the money is allocated and how it is spent. For that you really do need to enter the murky world of national and local government finance.
| Department for Transport statistics | |||||
| Modal comparisons | |||||
| Table TSGB0118 | |||||
| Public Expenditure on Transport by function1: 2005/06-20010/11 | |||||
| £ million (outturn prices) | |||||
| 2008/09 | 2009/10 | 2010/11 | |||
| National Roads | 3,624 | 4,311 | 3,753 | ||
| Capital | 1,557 | 2,549 | 2,198 | ||
| Current | 2,067 | 1,761 | 1,554 | ||
| Local Roads | 5,572 | 5,776 | 5,696 | ||
| Capital | 3,330 | 3,340 | 3,425 | ||
| Current | 2,242 | 2,437 | 2,271 | ||
| Local Public Transport | 3,579 | 3,944 | 4,914 | ||
| Capital | 589 | 1,080 | 1,880 | ||
| Current | 2,990 | 2,864 | 3,034 | ||
| Railways | 7,018 | 7,626 | 7,606 | ||
| Capital | 6,033 | 5,630 | 5,687 | ||
| Current | 985 | 1,996 | 1,920 | ||
| Other Transport | 1,033 | 1,037 | 932 | ||
| Capital | 292 | 249 | 250 | ||
| Current | 741 | 787 | 682 | ||
| UK total | 20,827 | 22,693 | 22,901 | ||
| Capital | 11,801 | 12,848 | 13,440 | ||
| Current | 9,026 | 9,845 | 9,462 | ||
| 1. Figures taken from Public Expenditure Statistical Analysis, HMT see | |||||
| http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/pespb_natstats_oct2011.htm | |||||
| These include public spending by central and local government as well as capital spending by public corporations in the UK. There | |||||
| are some slight differences between these figures and those from the downloadable HMT tables referenced in other tables due to | |||||
| differences in the timing of the data collections. | |||||
