Baker kneads local transport into shape for a world with less dough

The waiting is over, the cuts have begun. The £683m lopped off the DfT’s budget this year is just the curtain-raiser for much bigger cuts to be announced in the autumn spending review. Transport minister Norman Baker tells Andrew Forster how he plans to steer the local transport agenda through these difficult times

Norman Baker didn’t come into politics to announce bad news. As the Liberal Democrat’s transport spokesman in the run-up to the General Election he made eyecatching pledges to re-open railway lines, cut train fares and build a high-speed railway. But this has all had to be put on the backburner as the Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition puts reducing the country’s budget deficit above everything else.

Sitting in his office at the DfT’s Marsham Street HQ, Baker says...

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