Road Maintenance

John Lamont Excerpts

Monday 7th April 2025 Commons Chamber

[John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)]

Roads are crucial to life in the Scottish Borders. They are a lifeline. My constituency stretches from Cockburnspath in the north all the way down to Newcastleton, just north of Carlisle. It takes the best part of two and a half hours to drive from one end of it to the other. Excluding trunk roads, in the Scottish Borders there are 1,857 miles of local roads that the council are responsible for. In addition, there are many more miles of trunk roads, which the Scottish Government’s Transport Scotland is responsible for. Looking around the Chamber, I ask whether any other Member present can challenge that figure of 1,857 miles of local roads that the council is responsible for; it is a uniquely high figure.

Roads are essential for people in the Borders to get around, see friends, go to school, get to work and go to hospital appointments. It is crucial that we have good-quality roads to just exist, never mind enjoy any of the luxuries in life. It is perhaps not surprising, therefore, that I receive so much casework from constituents expressing concern about the quality of some of the roads and the lack of investment, which I will come on to. Also, when I do surveys and knock on doors each week, doing my residents doorstep surgeries, consistently potholes will be the No. 1 issue that local residents raise with me.

I do not think any other Member has yet paid tribute to the hard-working council employees who do a very good job of fixing the roads under very difficult circumstances. They might not have the resources or all the equipment that they need, but they are doing the best they can in very challenging circumstances to make the roads as good as they can be. They often go above and beyond what is their job to ensure that the roads, which are often in the communities that they live in themselves, are maintained to the best possible standard.

Very often, what makes such employees’ life even more difficult is the fact that electricity, gas or broadband companies come into their communities and dig up the roads. The council employees might come and fix a road one week, then discover that a few days or weeks later, a utility company will come through and dig up the road again. Much more needs to be done, both by the UK Government and the Scottish Government, who are responsible for this policy area in Scotland, to ensure that these types of utility companies are under a much tougher obligation to restore roads to the standard that they were in prior to the work being carried out, or indeed bring them up to an even better standard. If they choose to do the work, they need to invest in the road so that it is brought up to a good standard once they have completed it.

My council, Scottish Borders council, has invested in the JCB Pothole Pro equipment, which the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Dr Gardner) mentioned. Amid growing concerns about the state of the roads in the Borders, the council felt that it was a good investment. They bought one, and have now hired a second. This machine carried out 1,889 road repairs between April and the end of December last year, which resulted in a significant improvement in the local road network. There is still a huge backlog of road repairs, thanks largely to the lack of investment by the SNP Government; I will come to that shortly. Scottish Borders council has also set up a new interactive map on its website of the whole council area. People can identify roads and provide evidence of potholes that need to be fixed.

As a consequence of that investment, a recent freedom of information request to all United Kingdom councils showed that Scottish Borders council has spent millions of pounds on fixing potholes across the Borders. In 2020-21, it invested £2.5 million; in 2021-22, it invested £3.2 million; and in 2022-23, it invested £3.8 million, totalling over £9.6 million over three years. I commend my Conservative-controlled council for making this level of investment. But on the other side of the equation, it has had to pay out more than £17 million in compensation to road users and car drivers because of damage caused by potholes. Although the council has achieved a lot, there is much work still to do. I pay tribute to my Conservative colleagues on Scottish Borders council for what they have done.

Like many other councils in Scotland, Scottish Borders council is under severe financial pressure because the Scottish nationalist Government in Edinburgh are not investing in local councils, particularly rural councils like mine in the borders. The Scottish Government often ignore the needs of rural communities across Scotland and invest instead in the central belt.

Indeed, the cuts that the Scottish Government have imposed on local authorities, including my own, were recently described as “brutal” and “savage” cuts on local authorities, resulting in many, if not all, councils across Scotland having to make very difficult choices between investment and supporting vital local services.

Although a few Labour Members representing Scottish constituencies are present for this debate on road maintenance, it is telling that SNP colleagues representing rural constituencies like my own are not here to talk about the very challenging road networks in their constituencies. The fact they are not here to defend the Scottish Government’s decision to cut road investment—their Benches are empty—says a lot.

[Robbie Moore]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is not just north of the border that these cuts are being made? South of the border, we have seen this new Labour Government cut the local service delivery grant by over £100 million. The grant is specifically allocated to assist rural councils in providing much-needed services, such as pothole maintenance, where the cost of delivery is much higher in rural areas. Does he agree that was the wrong decision for this Labour Government to make?

[John Lamont]

I do agree, and I will develop that point. My concern is that policymakers, whether here in Westminster or in Edinburgh, have an urban outlook to transport. They assume that people have access to buses and trains, but those of us living in rural communities do not, so roads and cars become much more important.

[Dr Scott Arthur (Edinburgh South West) (Lab)]

I have to point out that Edinburgh is Scotland’s lowest funded local authority, looking at the block grant allocation. In preparing for this debate, I checked what the Scottish Government have been saying about the pothole crisis in Scotland, and I found that they have said absolutely nothing. Has the hon. Gentleman been able to find anything from them on this issue?

[John Lamont]

The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point. Scottish Borders council would be very grateful to receive the level of funding that Edinburgh council receives. Notwithstanding that, it is a problem that the Scottish Government do not invest in roads in the way we would expect.

The hon. Member will be fully aware of the scandal surrounding the A9, which does not affect my constituency or, indeed, his, but the delays and the broken promises that the SNP has made to upgrade that vital road linking the north of Scotland with the rest of Scotland—and the rest of the UK, for that matter—have caused huge frustrations to the rural communities it serves.

My criticism is not only directed at the SNP Government. As Labour Members will realise, the Labour Government are not immune from criticism either. The previous Conservative Government promised to invest in upgrading the A1 between Morpeth and Ellingham, and this Government’s decision to cancel that upgrade has caused great upset not just in my constituency but in Northumberland.

The A1 is a vital road for the local economy in the Scottish Borders, and it is also a vital road in Northumberland. It is unfortunate that the hon. Member for North Northumberland (David Smith) is no longer in his place, but that road supports local jobs and the local economy. Savagely cutting that funding and scrapping the investment to improve that road will undoubtedly cause economic hardship for the communities that rely on that road.

[Robbie Moore]

Does my hon. Friend agree that this causes inconvenience not only to the many commuters who use the A1, who want better connectivity north of the border, but to the landowners who have been moved around in the negotiations for years? This Labour Government’s decision to scrap the funding allocated for the A1 upgrade not only affects local businesses in Alnwick and the safety of the crossings in Felton and Ellingham, and the like, but affects people who own land either side of the A1 who have been put through huge uncertainty.

[John Lamont]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point, and the local press in Northumberland is full of stories of people who are effectively trapped.

[Joe Morris (Hexham) (Lab)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[John Lamont]

I will come to the hon. Gentleman—patience. The local press is full of stories of people who are trapped as a consequence of this Labour Government’s choice not to invest in the A1.

I will now happily give way to the hon. Member for Hexham (Joe Morris), who will perhaps explain why he supports the cancelling of the A1 upgrade.

[Joe Morris]

I remind the hon. Members for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (John Lamont) and for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) that Northumberland now has four Labour MPs as a result of the neglect and contempt in which the county was held by the last Conservative Government. I also remind them that the Government in which they served were very much responsible for misleading the people of Northumberland by promising the A1 dualling without providing any money for it. Is that contempt not at the heart of why they lost Northumberland in such spectacular fashion?

[John Lamont]

The hon. Member for North Northumberland is no longer in his place, but he made an intervention earlier. He was very clear in his election leaflets that he was absolutely committed to upgrading and dualling the A1—a promise that has now been ripped up. I suspect the people of Northumberland will remember that when the next election day comes.

That A1 is crucial to North Northumberland and to my constituents. Its road safety is terrible. Forget the economic arguments; the safety arguments make it all the more important. [Interruption.] Labour Members can shake their heads all they want, but it is a choice that this Labour Government made, that Labour Members made, having told the electorate the complete opposite before the election.

My concern is that this Government and the SNP Government in Edinburgh sadly assume that everybody lives in a big city or a big town. They assume that people have access to buses or trains. For those of us living in Coldstream in my constituency, it is 14 miles to the nearest station, and the regular bus—the busy bus—comes every two or three hours. Unless we have access to a car and a good-quality road network, we are stuck.

It is regrettable that this Government are not prioritising the A1, which supports my constituency to a certain extent. More importantly from my perspective, it is regrettable that the SNP Scottish Government are not investing in the roads of the Scottish Borders in the way they should—and I remind the House that SNP Members are not in the Chamber today to stand up for their communities who want investment in their roads.