Hammond needs to look beyond road-building to lift UK's productivity

Picking infrastructure is easy, but unless low pay in the services sector is addressed productivity goals will remain elusive

All roads lead to Rome, and experience would suggest, all autumn statements lead to roads.

Under Alistair Darling there was an M1 upgrade in what was then called a pre-budget report. His Conservative successor George "we are the builders" Osborne pledged the biggest road investment programme since the 1970s and a permanent pothole fund. Then last week, Osborne's successor Philip Hammond stuck with tradition and promised to push ahead with road schemes in the "northern powerhouse" and to tackle congestion on key routes under plans to revive the UK's pitiful productivity growth.