Within Central Government in England, responsibility for ensuring the country has a good transport infrastructure lies with the Department for Transport. With an annual spend of around £12 billion, the Department for Transport ranked 11th amongst Central Government Departments in 2010-11 and 2011-12, representing just 2% of the total central government spend. See post on Central Government Spending for details.
Using data compiled by the Guardian in their datablog Government Spending by Department 2011-12: get the data, here’s a quick summary of how the Department for Transport spent it’s money in 2011-12.
- The single biggest cost (around £4 billion) for the Department was the Highways Agency, accounting for 25% of total Department spend (down from 30% in 2010-11).
- £7.6 billion, or 52% of the budget was spent on Strategic Transport (highways Agency, Network Rail, Crossrail and High Speed 2)
- £6.5 billion, or 44% of the budget was spent on Local Transport (London transport, Local Authority transport, bus subsidies and concessionary fares, other railways, sustainable travel and tolled crossings)
- Half of the spend on Local Transport (£3.25 billion) is for London, leaving 120 local highway authorities across the rest of England with £3.25 billion (20% of total department spend) for delivering local transport.
