Road Maintenance

Tom Hayes Excerpts

Monday 7th April 2025 Commons Chamber

[Tom Hayes (Bournemouth East) (Lab)]

For 14 long years, road users in Bournemouth got a raw deal. Motorists pay their taxes, but they have got little back. Bournemouth and the south-west have been left behind and left out, but no longer. The broken roads that our Labour Government inherited are not only risking lives, but costing working families, drivers and businesses hundreds if not thousands of pounds in avoidable vehicle repairs. Fixing the basic infrastructure that this country and our town rely on is central to delivering national renewal, improving living standards and securing the future of Bournemouth and Britain.

This is also a question of trust. When I was going around knocking on doors in the two years before the election and during the general election itself, people said to me on the doorstep, “You seem like a nice guy. We want to vote for you, but how do we know that when you go to Parliament, you will not turn out like the last lot and not deliver on the promises you said you would keep?” I can now go to people’s doorsteps and talk about this Labour Government’s prioritisation of fixing our roads, matching words with deeds.

We have committed significant sums of money, at a time of difficult fiscal circumstances, to repair our roads. We are not only investing an additional £4.8 billion to deliver vital road schemes and maintain major roads across the country to get Britain moving as part of our plan for change, but handing councils a record £1.6 billion to repair roads and fill millions of potholes across the country. My own Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole council has received more than £10 million from the Government to fix our roads over the next 12 months. I spoke to our council leader on 28 March to make the point that we need to use the money or lose it. She has a long list of roads that need fixing, and I am confident that they will be fixed.

The lack of investment to date is a false economy, because when we do not invest in our roads in the first instance, we just store up bigger problems and bigger repair costs. My hope is that by investing in our roads now, we can save the taxpayer money and finally have roads that are roadworthy. Investing in roads saves local councils money. In 2023, BCP council had to dish out £16,000 in compensation because of the frailty of our roads. We also need to get our fundamentals right. We have heard in this debate about how utility companies will swan in, dig up a road that has been repaired and make it worse. We need to ensure that that does not happen.

We also need to think about our pavements. I have lost count of the number of elderly ladies with whom I have spoken on the doorstep who say that they would go into our district centres and town centres, but they are too scared of slipping on broken pavements, cracking a hip and not being able to get the hip replacement they need quickly enough, because they know that the NHS was ruined under the last Conservative Government.

I commend BCP council and the council officers for targeting the key roads in my constituency that need fixing. I am pleased that Cranleigh Road and Gainsborough Road have had major work completed, and I am pleased that treatment work has been completed on Wheaton Road, Abinger Road, Leaphill Road, Scotter Road and Roberts Road. I called for those works on constituents’ behalf.

I am pleased to see plans for the resurfacing of sections of Ashley Road in Boscombe as part of the towns fund, which is a much-needed investment in that area. I am also pleased that we will see significant works on Holdenhurst Road. That is particularly important to support not only road users—households and families—but our tradespeople. When I knock on doors and talk with our small business owners and tradespeople, they constantly talk about having their tools stolen and the fact that repairing or replacing them can cost up to £2,730. The threat of crime is a constant worry, but their roads just are not being fixed, despite the fact that they pay so much money in taxes.

I will close by saying that road safety is not only about repairing the potholes on our roads; it is about making sure that we invest in pedestrian crossings. I have been working with Councillor Sharon Carr-Brown of Queen’s Park and Charminster ward to introduce a zebra crossing on Queen’s Park Avenue to enable schoolchildren to more easily access that busy street. Currently, the Department for Transport does not permit the use of side road zebras on the public highway. Using them would allow stretched council budgets to go further in improving the public’s ability to safely cross the roads. I have been calling on the Department for Transport to support local councillors’ calls, and my own calls, for better zebra crossing provision.

I am glad that we are ending the pothole plague. I commend my residents and constituents for calling for improved roads, and I will continue to work alongside them to make the case for more funding and better investment in our roads.