11 Use of Resources
11.1 Evidence that Allocations have been Spent Effectively and Efficiently
11.1.1 The 10 Greater Manchester authorities all have different transport issues, resulting from differing socio-economic, geographical and topographical characteristics, and transport resources are spent in relation to these factors. However, all LTP spending is linked to the shared priorities of congestion, accessibility, road safety and air quality and to the performance indicators of maintenance, road accidents, public transport, accessibility, travel to school mode share, peak time traffic flow to key centres (including the airport) and air quality.
11.1.2 Currently, LTP Integrated Transport Block (ITB) and maintenance is allocated on a needs basis (both nationally and locally), with reference to the LTP objectives and targets. This distribution allows resources to be targeted, taking into account the population in each authority, but also weighted to take into account vehicle kilometres and the level of road accidents on their roads and a number of other socio-economic indicators. This allows Greater Manchester's spend to be linked to it's targets across the shared priorities.
11.1.3 Major scheme proposals were previously agreed countywide by AGMA on the basis of contribution to objectives and maintaining a fair geographical balance. More recently, they have also been subject to regional assessment through the RFA procecess.
11.1.4 The arrangements worked satisfactorily, but are now under review because of the potential of large scale funding (for example, Metrolink and TIF) to distort this balance of funding. We are currently conducting a financial review, the fundamental issue being the need to ensure that transport investment across Greater Manchester is in line with the achievement of the broad scope of strategy objectives. Problems may arise if substantial investment is concentrated in a particular geographical area or to tackle a particular objective, as this may mean other areas’ needs, or other strategy aims, are relatively neglected. A fair balance must be maintained. The principles will be used to shape and assess a number of potential models for distributing future ITB funding, in order that a new, transparent and politically acceptable method can be found. More evidence that allocations can be spent effectively and efficiently can be seen in 11.5 ‘Practices to Increase Value for Money and Efficiency’.