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‘No good options’ as 'skint' council to press on with Melton's relief road despite soaring costs


The bill has jumped from an initial estimate of £63.5 million to a potential £127 million


Councillors say they have no choice but to press ahead with a much-needed relief road which will ease a town's congestion problems despite the hefty and rising price tag. The future of the long-awaited Melton Mowbray Distributor Road was called into question recently after it was revealed Leicestershire County Council would need to spend more on the project than originally thought.


The route was designed to reduce the regular tail-backs which clog the centre of Melton. However, soaring inflation, particularly in the construction sector, has caused the price to jump from an initial estimate of £63.5 million to a potential £127 million


The £51 million difference is to be shouldered by the cash-strapped authority – leading to questions over whether the scheme was affordable and whether the ultimate cost outweighed the benefits. However, there would also be consequences to scrapping the scheme, which would lead to the construction of thousands of homes, while pausing it could result in even higher costs for the council.


On Wednesday this week, (November 9), Declan Keegan, head of finance told councillors at a meeting of the council's scrutiny commission: "There are no good options.


"If we proceed, it’s going to cost us a lot of money and we’re bearing all the construction risks. If we stop we don’t save a lot of money, but we still need to deal with the housing somehow. And if pause it simply just makes the situation worse.”


The new single carriageway road is set begin at a new roundabout in the A6006 Nottingham Road and run north of the town between it and Twinlakes Park then along the eastern boundary of Melton before re-joining the A6006 Burton Road.


A southern section has also been agreed which would link at the Burton Road end of the first phase and continue round to the A607 Leicester Road.


The Government agreed in 2019 to put up £49.5 million of the original price tag, with the county council providing the remaining £14 million. However, this would have been recovered through Section 106 contributions – legally binding financial agreements between authorities and developers which are use to help fund infrastructure projects.


However, each member of the scrutiny commission agreed there really was only one way forward. Coalville South representative Councillor Keith Merrie said: “The link road project to me is like a domino. If it doesn’t go ahead and the domino falls, it has knock-on effects. There’ll be seven years of time, effort, resources and costs gone.

“We won’t recover that. Improved air quality in the town centre of Melton, gone. It won’t be improved. Potential 4,500 houses, 20 hectares of employment land and all the Section 106 money that would come with it, that’s gone. New primary school, gone.





The preferred route of Melton relief road (Image: Leicestershire County Council)


“The Melton Local Plan in my opinion would fail. And last but not least the statement of common ground which has been worked on for quite some time now to meet Leicester’s unmet housing need is all but finalised that will fail. That would have a bigger knock-on effect in that all the local plans would potentially fail.”


“It’s a difficult one because we’re skint, we’ve got no money,” he added. “But I definitely think we should go ahead.”


Councillor Terry Richardson, who represents Narborough and Whetstone, said: “Going ahead is the only game in town. We have to consider as the highways authority the impact of local plans falling over at district level, which I think would be catastrophic to us.


“It would cost us far more than the additional costs here. And we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact we’re talking about 4,500 homes here, even if it’s a 20-year build. In 20 years time we’ll be receiving an extra £9 million in Council Tax.


“The difference between the two options is only £300,000. But there is absolutely no option but to do this to retain our credibility. I think we’ve got to show the Government we’re credible people to take money off them for these scheme and deliver them. If we don’t deliver these schemes Leicestershire will be the worse for it.”


Council leader Councillor Nick Rushton said his colleagues needed to “recognise the scheme is costly, recognise we might have to make some savings in our budget in future years and recognise it places very serious doubt on future schemes without more Government money”. However, he too said there was no other option.


He said: “There is no where else to go except to bite the bullet and fund the scheme. We’re going to have to do it, the numbers show we should do it. There is no downside to doing it.

“Everything about the scheme has positive benefits, this only negative is that we have to put it onto the Council Tax. We’ll have to borrow in the long-term, so that will be added to everybody’s Council Tax and there are probably on 60-odd thousand residents in Melton Mowbray who on the face of it will benefit. But we’ll all benefit when we can go round Melton, rather than through the middle.

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