How Governments
Fail Tees Valley:
the Case of
Darlington Northern
Link Road
Route options for Darlington Northern Link Road. Source: TVCA Public Consultation brochure, Summer 2026
Scott Hunter
4 October 2026
In 2023, Middlesbrough MP, Andy McDonald, addressed the House of Commons, claiming that there was evidence of widespread corruption at the Tees Valley Combined Authority. The then Conservative government responded to the claims by setting up an inquiry. That enquiry lacked the wherewithal to examine corruption, but was otherwise thorough and the resulting report – the Tees Valley Review – was damning. As the 2024 general election approached many in the region believed that an incoming Labour government would be much more assertive in holding those responsible to account. That, however, has not transpired, for reasons not shared with the public, and the mismanagement of funds continues unabated.
The scandal revolves around the issuing of numerous contracts by the Tees Valley Combined Authority to two property developers, Martin Corney and Chris Musgrave. Repeatedly the interests of these developers, and of Corney in particular, appear to take precedence over the public interest. They have made millions while the regeneration schemes pursued by the Authority languish. The case of the Darlington Northern Link Road may yet turn out to be the latest iteration of this, but will hopefully help us to gain some insight into why the government is doing so little to rein in the mayor and prevent his worst excesses.
Background to the Scheme
While the A1(M) to the West of Darlington was built in the mid-1960s, the A66 to East of the town was not joined to it until the 1980s when a bypass was built. The purpose of this bypass was to improve the East-West transit route by linking the A66 East to the Western trans-Pennine route from Scotch Corner to Penrith and the M6. The limitation of this bypass, however, was that it linked only to the southbound carriageway of the A1(M). To access the A1(M) to the north, traffic, including heavy goods traffic, had to continue to pass along local roads in Darlington – the A1150 and the A167. An increase in traffic has led to congestion on those two local roads, hence the plans for a link road to the north to bypass the town altogether. So far so good.
No sooner had the Tees Valley Combined Authority been created in 2017, with responsibility for transport, than plans were initiated to alleviate this congestion (and one on the A19): TVCA AGENDA-PAPERS-5th-September-2017. By 2019 surveys of possible routes for what became known as the Darlington Northern Link Road (DNLR) had been undertaken by the TVCA but were judged by the Department for Transport to offer poor value for money.
The project had some new life injected into it in early 2024, however, when the TVCA was awarded £1 billion for transport projects, its dividend following the cancellation of HS2. The mayor then allocated £250 million to DNLR, allowing more detailed planning to take place.
The plan is attracting some spirited opposition, mainly from local people who smell a rat, because the road will pass close to a proposed housing development being put forward by Martin Corney (principally) – Skerningham Garden Village - leading to suspicion that the new road is intended to increase the value of the development land. Public consultation on the proposals for the road are due to end shortly, with several variations on offer, but campaigners are already claiming that the decision has been predetermined, favouring the route that passes closest to the garden village development.
The garden village project itself has a long and chequered history but was finally given the green light by Darlington Borough Council in 2024. The main developer is Skerningham Estates, whose beneficial owner is Theakston Estates, owned, in turn, by Martin Corney.
Once all the relevant permissions are obtained (such as the route of the access roads to the site) the developer will sell on the land to a housebuilder. The access road to any new housing development is the builder’s responsibility and will be adopted by a local authority only once completed. But access roads can be expensive. In the case of the garden village project the road will have to cross both the River Skerne and the East Coast main line, requiring the construction of bridges, in addition to a number of roundabouts linking the distributor road to local access roads to the village. Such is the cost of such a road that it might jeopardise the viability of the whole garden village scheme.
Help may be at hand for the developers, however, in the form of the Darlington Northern Link Road which is set to join the A66 on the Eastern outskirts of Darlington with the A1(M) at junction 59, and would inevitably follow a similar course to the garden village distributor road. Were the two to be combined the cost to the garden village builders may be significantly reduced and the commercial viability of the housing development secured.
Although the TVCA intends to fund the project, it still requires clearance from the Department for Transport. Details of the bewildering series of options offered for consultation by the TVCA have recently been presented by Ray Casey: when-is-a-consultation-not-a-consultation-when-its-the-darlington-bypass.
The route marked on the map above as “do minimum” is the one that passes close to the proposed garden village, and is approximately 2.5 miles from the A66 to a new junction on the A167. An extension to that road, marked here as “Variant A” draws traffic away from the A167 and adds a further 1.5 miles to the link road. The route marked as “more ambitious” is longer, and passes mainly through fields. One possible scheme would have this route also joining up with Variant A. This would be around 5.5 miles in total. The proposed garden village is not marked on the map but occupies the space below the “do minimum” line. It is proposed that the do-minimum road would be at a distance to village housing and would be accessed via a series of roundabouts on the road, which would have a 40 mph speed limit.
While campaigners have framed their objections to the link road in terms of the benefit to the developers, the TVCA does not. In order to understand the issues fully it is necessary to set the garden village issue to one side and examine the case put forward by the Tees Valley Combined Authority itself, and ask, is there a robust case for the scheme at all?
Understanding the options
An Options Assessment Report (OAR) by the firm Jacobs was produced earlier this year: Final-DNLR-OAR. The report is generally thorough and details the problem that the new road is intended to alleviate, which is that that the A1150, or Salters Lane, which contains housing, a school campus and a supermarket, experiences frequent traffic congestion. The route is regularly used by heavy goods vehicles, with peak usage in late mornings, which is problematic in such a densely populated area. The report also discusses the need for what is known as ‘resilience’ which is for the road network to have suitable alternative routes if a traffic diversion is necessary. Whichever route is chosen for the new link road, resilience in the local road network will be improved, as both the main route options run roughly in parallel to the A1150.
There are, however, a couple of curious aspects to the OAR. One concerns traffic volumes, shown in the table below from page 63 of the document:
The baseline data indicate that, in 2024, approximately 12,000 vehicles a day passed along the road. The data sent to local residents as part of the public consultation process, meanwhile, give the following information about the amount of traffic that the link road will remove from the A1150:
Source TVCA: “Consultation on Proposed Darlington Northern Link Road”, Summer 2026
In this table the ‘do minimum’ column represents the route through Skerningham, while the ‘more ambitious’ option is further to the north. Compare the figures from the two tables and it appears that only 1,500 vehicles a day use the A1150 for access to destinations within Darlington, while over 10,000 are using it as a transit route.
It may be the case that these proportions are correct, but if so, where did the authors of the OAR obtain their information? Casual observation of the road suggests that a much greater proportion of traffic is local and destined for other parts of Darlington. However, Jacobs undertook a traffic census with information being gathered at various points along the A1150 and A167 as far a A1(M) at junction 59. This is, however, unsatisfactory as it provides no data on where the traffic originates and what its principal destinations are.
Here the OAR presents only assertion, but no evidence. Section 4.3 of the report informs us that traffic originates in the East from Teesworks and Teesside Airport, and in the West from Merchant Park in Newton Aycliffe. Elsewhere it mentions the Teesside Freeport International Gateway (and we have no idea what that is supposed to be). But that is all.
There are a number of curious aspects to this characterization of the traffic currently clogging up the A1150 and the A167. The first is that, while the ‘do minimum’ option might be the shortest route across Darlington, it is not the shortest route for Teesside traffic to reach most northerly destinations. The shortest route for traffic moving from Teesside to Durham, Newcastle and beyond is via the A19, and, where necessary using East-West link roads such as the A689.
A second issue is that none of the facilities mentioned appear to generate that much traffic. Teesworks has the SeAH factory which has the South Bank quay attached and uses shipping to move its product. In addition, a power station and a data centre are under construction. Once completed, neither will generate a great deal of traffic. So, projections for traffic increase on local roads in Darlington is unlikely to come from these sources.
As for the freeport itself, it is a rather shadowy organization, although we are aware of companies, mainly at Wilton, that are part of it. Unlike other freeports around the country, it is not listed (under the name Teesside Freeport, at least) in Companies House. The newsfeed on its website was last updated in 2023:
Source: Teesside Freeport newsfeed
In fact, the main facility for the movement of goods appears to be Teesside Airport, which is relatively close to Darlington. The cargo division, however, continues to carry less than any other dedicated cargo handling airport in the UK (high point was April this year with approximately 1200 tonnes. After that, following the collapse of the firm European Cargo, freight has been 200 – 400 tonnes a month). Not enough to cause a traffic jam on any road.
At this point, despite the visible congestion on Darlington’s roads, the case for the new link road begins to look rather shallow. Jacobs, in addition to making a disputable case for Teesworks and various parts of the freeport being the cause of that congestion, then omit to mention some sources of HGV traffic that might, in fact, be more plausible. One of these is the Amazon distribution centre on the A66 south/Darlington bypass route; a second is a logistics park – Ingenium Parc – under construction near the same road, which is being part funded by the TVCA, and which will, when completed, contribute to the increase in traffic over the next few years as predicted by Jacobs.
While neither of these facilities alone may be considered a huge contributor to traffic congestion in the town, the fact is that the DfT (or Highways England) has previously rated the DNLR as providing poor value for money. So, we might expect Jacobs to include even minor contributors to the ongoing congestion. But they don’t. As traffic from Teesside is not likely to use the road to access destinations further North, and traffic from Darlington is ignored, the rationale for the road looks as if it’s principally a super-highway to Newton Aycliffe. And while we do not wish to underestimate the importance of Newton Aycliffe as a centre for commerce and industry, the creation of such a dedicated route to it seems more than a little generous.
And, given that the case presented for the road is weaker than necessary, is the mayor likely to get away with selling the scheme to the DfT, and, in so doing, find yet another way to assist his favourite property developer?
Houchen has Skin in the Game
As preliminary to looking at how the mayor might seek to present his case for the DNLR, it is useful to understand just how committed he is to the Skerningham Garden Village scheme. The first point to note is that he has been actively supporting it ever since he entered office in 2017. While the possibility of the northern link road emerged in 2017, within twelve months, Houchen was openly supporting the garden village. Long before Darlington Council gave planning permission for the scheme, Corney, in 2018, had a brochure produced to advertise it. The foreword in that brochure was written by Ben Houchen:
This was therefore written shortly after Corney’s business associate, Ian Waller, first made a £5,000 donation to Houchen, as recorded in Electoral Commission filings:
An official statement linking the DNLR to housing development first appears in TVCA documents in 2019 (where ‘both schemes’ refers to the DNLR and an upgrade to the A19), although Skerningham Garden Village isn’t mentioned by name:
Source: TVCA cabinet papers, 31 January 2019
The fact that the ‘do minimum’ route for the DNLR is also the shortest is perhaps an indication that this is the one most likely to be acceptable to the DfT. After all, roads are expensive. A road of similar length, plus bridges plus roundabouts was completed at Melton Mowbray in Leicestershire this year at a cost of £134.6 million.
Everything therefore points to the preferred option being the route that coincidentally benefits Skerningham Estates, provided the DfT accepts the case made for it, and before that the endorsement of the TVCA cabinet.
The TVCA Cabinet will not Challenge the Mayor
One of the criticisms of the Authority discussed in the Tees Valley Review was that the council leaders who make up the TVCA cabinet were unable to scrutinise decisions adequately as they were kept very poorly informed. The inference was that, once properly informed, these cabinet members would step up to the plate and hold the mayor to account. This has not transpired, however, and cabinet members continue to meekly go along with whatever egregious spending decisions the mayor decides.
While it’s hard to overlook the manifest inadequacy of the council leaders, and their failure to play their part in reining in the mayor’s worst excesses, there is at least, as it turns out, an explanation for their torpor. The explanation lies in some sections in the TVCA constitution – unique arrangements that do not, as far as we can tell, feature in the constitutions of other combined authorities.
Source: TVCA Constitution, 2026
The gist of this text is that any decision can be made with a majority vote of the cabinet but only if the mayor is part of that majority. In a subsequent paragraph it states that where the mayor is not one of the majority, the issue is recorded as ‘not decided’. In other words, Houchen has a veto on all cabinet decisions. There is no point in disagreeing with his opinion, as no decision can be made unless it has his approval. So, the cabinet’s hands are tied.
Not that they deserve any sympathy. Cabinet members could probably have done something about this unfortunate state of affairs either at the point where the Tees Valley Review was published and the TVCA had to take steps to implement its recommendations, or when the Authority was served a Best Value Notice. They seized neither opportunity, so they will not be opposing whatever route option the mayor chooses for the DNLR.
The Mayor, the Developer and the Department for Transport
Public consultation on the new road is about to end and the next step is to persuade the Department for Transport that the scheme is beneficial and offers value for money. So, will the civil servants remain skeptical of the proposals, or has the mayor, with the help of Jacobs, done enough to win them over? There are reasons to believe that the TVCA plans will be viewed more sympathetically than they deserve. Those reasons are circumstantial, however, and are based on the difference in attitude between the Labour Party in opposition and the Labour Party in government.
When Houchen was first accused of corruption, there was a chorus of indignant voices in Parliament shouting for the National Audit Office to be brought in to investigate – Labour MPs standing by their principles and intent on rooting out corruption. Once in government, however, no such action was taken. In fact, there was a silence around Houchen. What did happen was that moves were made to extend devolution in England. Since the elevation of the new Prime Minister, devolution has moved up the agenda and now has a central place in the plans for the transformation of government. And there remains a silence around Houchen.
Why? Because a government wishing to showcase the bright new future of devolved government does not want the attract attention to the weak spots in its plan. So, the mayor is spared the investigation and the headlines that it might generate.
A second shift of opinion concerns freeports. Once scorned by Labour, the idea is now looked on more favourably. The freeports programme now enjoys government support. So, again, it does not want to be seen to have to pick up the pieces when one of these schemes fails.
And the mayor presents his scheme for the DNLR in terms of how it will help the Teesside Freeport to flourish, a line of argument that people in the Tees Valley may be skeptical about, but the DfT less so.
The strategy might just work, leaving Houchen in charge, Corney in pocket, and the people of the Tees Valley in the lurch.
At this point it is for the Government to demonstrate that it can see the warts on the system of devolution it has inherited and is prepared to take action to ensure that devolution and freeports genuinely serve the communities they are intended to support. For nearly a decade now the Tees Valley has been the land of make believe, where endless promises of jam tomorrow mask the reality of endless government incompetence. And as regards the DNLR it’s up to the DfT to show that they have the capacity to critically appraise the plans being presented to them.