Potholes and Road Maintenance

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Tuesday 5th June 2018 Westminster Hall

[Yasmin Qureshi (Bolton South East) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered potholes and road maintenance.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gapes, in discussing this vital issue.

On the surface, potholes and road maintenance may not sound like the most appealing or urgent of concerns. However, roads are a reflection of a country’s infrastructure and ability to provide essential services. Good roads are the lifeblood of our country. They connect communities, families, livelihoods and industries. They allow ambulances to reach their destinations faster, citizens to spend less of their already busy lives in traffic, and the police to reach those in need more quickly.

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on introducing the debate. Does she agree that potholes not only present a cost, an inconvenience and sometimes a delay to motorists, but are a severe risk to life and limb for people riding bikes? Some 390 cyclists have been killed or seriously injured in the last 10 years as a result of potholes and bad road surfaces.

[Yasmin Qureshi]

I entirely agree, and I was going to come on to that point in my speech a bit further down the road.

Today, our roads are unarguably in a state of disrepair that worsens by the day. A brief survey of the facts reveals that the challenges that we face will increase if the Government continue to ignore concerns.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jesse Norman]

It is certainly preferable, as the potholes review and other survey work recognised, that it be done right first time. Roads should be reinstated in a way that allows the changes to be durable, and road surfaces should be able to stand inclement weather.

Our overall approach is based on principles of asset management, increasing over time. The Government are investing about £6 billion in the network between 2015 and 2021—about £1 billion a year—including through the pothole action fund. That money is increasingly being used as part of a more strategic, asset management-type approach to the roads, which is important. As part of that, we have looked very hard at how we can help highway authorities to adopt planned and preventive maintenance that treats the asset as such, rather than just respond reactively to problems that emerge. Those principles are already demonstrating benefits in terms of financial efficiency, improved accountability, value for money and improved customer service, and we want to continue to work on that.

As matters are presently handled, there is a formula, and rightly so. We do not think councils should constantly have to apply for the vast preponderance of the funding that they receive from the Department for local roads. They should be funded according to an easier and fairer formula.

[Ruth Cadbury]

Does the Minister agree that the £43 million and the officer time spent because 156 local authorities have to deal with claims from motorists and other road users as a result of pothole damage and injury are a waste of money?