As the sun sets on Orwell, we need a plan to bridge the gap.

 I met Rachel Reeves recently and rather enjoyed our encounter. 

Yes, you read that correctly. 

 

I was part of a small Suffolk Chamber of Commerce delegation that had some facetime with the shadow chancellor of the exchequer. Actually, I was rather impressed, which if you know my generic contempt for virtually all of our political class, is praise indeed. Although she repeated the lines quoted in The Guardian that day, she came across clearly, with a strong voice, clear diction, and a real confidence which was encouraging, particularly as she’s odds on to be our next Chancellor of The Exchequer.

So has this libertarian gone all red? 

No way! But I do recognise opportunities for the betterment of Suffolk when I see them. My grandfather frequently said that our sector - warehousing and logistics - always did well under a Labour government. It's all the social control freakery and interference in the decisions always best taken by individuals and families that I hate.

 

And whilst I’m dubious as to whether Sir Keir Starmer has many core values (all those flip-flops), it’s certainly true that he’s moved his party away from the posturing rabble that it had become under the member for Islington North.

 

Back to my encounter with Ms Reeves.

I appreciated being right in front of a politician to give me the opportunity to articulate that economic, and so social, prosperity meant clearly defining what is the responsibility of the state and those areas where the state needs to, to put it crudely, butt out.

 

I believe that the state only has a legitimate role in the defence of the country and where significant market failure means the private sector cannot take on the burden of risk required.

 

This is particularly true of capital expenditure projects, such as upgrades to rail lines, new EV charging & digital networks, and improved road systems.

 

The inclusion of the last category will almost certainly have the zero-growth extremists in the Green Party taking up the online equivalent of similar shades of ink in anger. No more roads – ever, seems to be their mantra, regardless as to how a poor infrastructure locks-in inequalities, crushes competition, makes goods & services more expensive, and generally pits the environment against living standards.

 

It doesn’t need to be this way. Surely, what we need are better, not worse roads? And nowhere is this truer than here in Suffolk.

 

My question to the person who could be in charge of public tax and spending plans in the next Government was this:

 

“The Greater Ipswich sub-region, including the port of Felixstowe, suffers greatly when the Orwell Bridge closes. What are the Labour Party’s plans for sustainable road improvements that would mitigate future bridge closures, and would these include a new bridge, a tunnel, or perhaps even a northern route around the county town?

Before answering, may I remind you of the strategic importance to UK plc of, not just The Ports of Felixstowe and Ipswich, but also the critical need to have Sizewell C built, and on-line, as soon as possible.”

 

OK, not the shortest question: but the point was understood. Whenever the Orwell Bridge closes  - as it did for hours and hours last month thanks to an ‘incident’, the whole of the roads network from the A140 eastwards grinds to the proverbial halt. Obviously, Ipswich is worst affected, but the surrounding sub-regional roads system can’t cope either.

 

Not only are people inconvenienced, but businesses lose money. In my trade, the margins on an articulated lorry coming out of Felixstowe to, say Birmingham are in single figures. A protracted wait on the A14, or the B1079, or the B1113, means that that journey is a loss-maker.

 

And it doesn’t take too many fleet’s lorries being impacted each and every time there are Bridge-related or A14 junction issues to have a direct impact on a company’s viability. It won’t have escaped your readers’ notice that quite a few local hauliers have folded in recent months.

 

The Greens are utterly unsympathetic and seem to relish the chaos on Suffolk’s arterial roads.

 

With utterly mishandled discussions (was this deliberate, I wonder?) regarding a Northern Relief Route around Ipswich, the county’s Conservatives have created a policy vacuum of the worst sort.

 

The irony being that many of those campaigners most opposed to a relief road are the ones struggling to get out of their driveways as their local routes become gridlocked.

 

The Conservatives seem to assume that drivers will just have to put up with delays upon delays.

 

No, we won’t. And whilst, as expected there were no firm commitments from Ms Reeves, I enjoyed the chance to put the case for short to medium road improvements and the need for longer-term thinking, not least as and when the Orwell Bridge needs to be replaced.

 

I must say that I was also pleasantly surprised by the performance of Jack Abbott, who had arranged the visit by Ms Reeves. Labour’s Parliamentary candidate for Ipswich seems very grounded and pragmatic, reminding me of the industrious Peter Aldous, the current conservative MP for Waveney.

 

If we are ever to address our roads crisis in the county, we certainly need more representatives who speak for the majority, and not narrow vested interest groups.

First published in the www.suffolkfreepress.co.uk on Thursday, March 7, 2024.