Fuel duty pledge could tackle potholes

8/7/14

By Ian Barnsley

The Coalition could raise another £1 billion to commit on fixing the roads of England and Wales, if it were to set aside an extra 2p a litre of the fuel duty it receives from the motoring public.

That is the view of the Nearby Government Association (LGA), an organisation that represents more than 370 local authorities.

It believes investing the money would be enough to repair all the potholes on the roads inside the next 10 years.

A current guarantee of millions of pounds of new funding to enhance the condition of the road ne2rk is only adequate to ‘patch up’; the method, and properly quick of the money the councils would need to guarantee routes are in a very good condition for years to come, the LGA claims.

£12bn necessary to repair road ne2rk

It says England and Wales need to have £12 billion to totally repair the road ne2rk, and the figure has risen by £1.5 billion in the final 12 months.

This is because of years of underfunding and some especially cold and wet winters in the last few years.

The government announced in June that it was pumping an additional £168 million into the nation’;s road infrastructure to make necessary repairs, and that the money would be accessible to 148 nearby authorities.

This has been described as the biggest investment in the roads given that the 1970s, and the Department for Transport expects the cash to repair far more than 3 million potholes and crumbling road surfaces.

‘Roads in disrepair’;

Councils are “trapped in an endless cycle of patching up our deteriorating ne2rk”, according to the chairman of the LGA’;s Economy and Transport Board, Councillor Peter Box.

“Our roads are in such disrepair that it will now take much more than a decade and £12 billion to bring them up to scratch,” he stated.

“Tackling this ever-growing national repair bill must be a priority and the government can do this by injecting an additional £1 billion a year into roads maintenance – funded by investing 2 pence a litre from existing fuel duty.

“Motorists spend billions to the Treasury every single year in fuel duty when they fill up their auto at the pumps only to then have to drive on roads that are decaying following decades of underfunding.

“They deserve roads fit for the 21st century,” Councillor Box stated.

Fuel duty pledge could tackle potholes