Shropshire gets £2.7 million to tackle potholes

Shropshire Council is to receive £2.24 million while Telford & Wrekin is to get £420,000.

The cash, handed over as part of a national multi-million pound fund, could be used to fix around 50,000 potholes across both authorities.

The Government has set aside £168 million to mend the nation's broken roads, spread across 148 councils.

Each council will get a share, but extra will be given to those which demonstrate "best practice in highways maintenance", including bringing in specialist machinery or setting up dedicated repair teams.

Shropshire Council recently won a national award for its work on dealing with potholes.

Shropshire Council, together with contractors Ringway, recently won the CIHT/Costain Effective Partnerships Award in this year's Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation Awards.

Council leader Keith Barrow said he was delighted to receive the cash.

"What we will do is get that money spent doing the work as quickly as we can," he said.

"We are delighted that the government has recognised the work we have done. In the past we would have just repaired the reported pothole, but now we do everything that needs doing. It has seen our productivity jump from fixing three potholes a day to fixing 24 a day."

"Because of the bad weather over the past few years the roads have taken a hammering.

"It is a big issue for people and it is a big issue for me."

However, the leader of Telford & Wrekin Council today said he was "disappointed" the authority had only been given £420,000 out of the national £168 million fund.

The cash will allow around 7,000 potholes to be repaired in the borough – but pales by comparison with the £2.24 million awarded to neighbouring Shropshire Council to fix 42,000.

Telford & Wrekin Council leader, Councillor Kuldip Sahota, said: "I obviously welcome the announcement that we are to receive £420,000 from the Department for Transport to repair potholes.

"I am disappointed it is not more as it is generally acknowledged that the roads network nationwide needs to be improved after a string of fairly severe winters and Telford & Wrekin is no exception.

"As a council, we are investing a total of £13.6m over two years in our Pride In Your Community programme – which includes regeneration initiatives targeting town and district centres as well as improving roads on estates and district centres."

The Department for Transport said the money must be used to repair potholes or ensure that they do not appear in the first place.

Councils will also have to publish updates on works every three months so residents can see how repairs are progressing, and all work has to be completed by March 2015.

Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin said: "Potholes are the bane of all our lives and the funding announced today is an important step in ridding our roads of this menace.

"But it is only one part of a massive programme of investment to get our country up to speed as part of this government's long term economic plan. By building, repairing and renewing our key infrastructure we will ensure the future growth and prosperity of this country."

The £168 million pothole funding was announced by Chancellor George Osborne in March's Budget, and is on top of the the extra £185 million the government made available that month to help repair local roads damaged by severe weather.

Some £24 billion will be spent on England's motorways and A-roads between 2010 and 2021, the biggest investment in the road network since the 1970s.

The Government said a further £7.4 billion would committed to local roads in the next Parliament, along with funding from the £12 billion Local Growth Fund.