County Council calls for fairer funding to look after the roads in Buckinghamshire

Buckinghamshire County Council is supporting calls to the Government for a fairer slice of funding for roads.

The support follows national research that shows London has the money to invest three times the amount compared to counties. And other major cities aren’t far behind.

Figures, produced by the County Councils Network (CCN), showed the 36 shire counties in the analysis were able to spend an average £20,885 per mile on road repairs, pothole filling, and building new junctions and roads last year. By contrast, London councils were able to spend an average £62,350 per mile.

Mark Shaw, Buckinghamshire County Council Deputy Leader and Transport Cabinet Member, said that while the authority was investing more than £20 million in roads in the current financial year, including halving the number of potholes needing repair last year*, it was still well below what he would like to see invested to bring all the county’s roads up to scratch.

Mark said: ‘Our road teams work tirelessly to keep our 2,000 miles of roads safe and resilient, and that includes a tremendous achievement in repairing road defects like potholes, but our budget is always under intense pressure.

It’s a fact that our roads are some of the busiest in the country and without adequate funding from Government, we’ll always be playing catch-up, particularly when you think of the damage done during the three months of rain we’ve just had.

The CCN analysis shows a big difference between the two sides of Buckinghamshire’s south eastern boundary; that our county’s motorists are the poor relation to drivers in London and other cities, when it comes to spending on mending potholes and improving local roads.

What’s needed is a more equitable allocation of Government funds across different council types, and a longer-term settlement for roads funding, rather than the current ad-hoc fund pots we have to bid for.

I welcome the CCN’s drive to influence the Government to correct this disparity.‘

*Potholes needing repair were reduced from 11,695 (April to September 2018) to 5,939 for the same period last year (April to September 2019).

*Source of article : Press release from Buckinghamshire County Council.