The new Secretary for Transport, Louise Haigh, from the recently elected Labour government in the UK, plans to invest “unprecedented levels of funding” in cycling and walking as a critical part of plans to improve health and inequality reports The Guardian.

Haigh also sits on the government’s health mission delivery board and says that a national network of safe cycle routes could cut GP (General Practitioner) appointments “by hundreds of thousands, if not millions a year” by helping people incorporate more physical activity into resident’s lives.

Transport is the largest single contributor to the UK’s carbon emissions and Haigh adds that “active travel” – a catch-all term for walking, cycling – will be “utterly essential to developing our national integrated transport strategy”.

Read the full report here.