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The government plans to spend roughly £ 7 million to rename Highways England as National Highways, just five years after its last multi-million dollar rebrand.
The name change, believed to have been imposed on the agency’s address by the Department of Transportation, has puzzled observers.
Labor said the move was puzzling, while the decision to change the name of a purely English agency as “national” has sparked anger in Wales, with Plaid Cymru calling the new name “self-aggrandizing and offensive.”
Government sources suggested that no final decision had been made, but that the name change would reflect its strategic importance.
It is understood that the independent government agency, which manages the strategic road network of the motorways and the main A roads, has recently completed the update of the signage from its last name change in April 2015.
Detailed instructions were given to contractors last year on how to ensure that the Highways England brand was painted on all brochures, roadworks posters, public documents and construction vehicles.
Matt Rodda, Labor shadow minister of roads, said: “At a time of national crisis, going through a national rebrand five years after the last will be disconcerting and will seem like a potential waste of taxpayer money to most people. The government must justify why they are doing this and how they came to the decision on the new name. “
A Welsh government source said the move “would unnecessarily confuse people as to where responsibility for roads lies: in Wales, with the Welsh government.”
The planned rebrand comes weeks after the government reignited a dispute over the M4 motorway in Wales. The Welsh government removed a planned relief road around Newport in 2019 for environmental reasons, but Boris Johnson suggested this month that it would find a way to restart the plan.
Plaid Cymru MP Liz Saville Roberts said: “Given this Westminster government’s obsession with tracing our return agreement, this rebranding is wrong, self-aggrandizing and offensive.
“Regardless of the UK government’s measures to undermine the powers of Wales through UK internal market law, the fact remains that the powers over the operation and maintenance of roads are fully delegated.
“It is beyond puzzling that the UK government has to remember this fact, more than 20 years since the establishment of the devolution.”
Highways England CEO Jim Sullivan resigned in August. A successor is expected in early 2021 to implement the next phase of the government’s £ 27bn road construction program.
The DfT declined to comment.
