Councils told to solve Britain’s pothole crisis

Councils in England must start to deal with the nation’s pothole crisis, or lose out of millions of pounds of funding.

From next month, local authorities will begin to share a £1.6 billion cash injection to repair broken Tarmac – but councils will be told to report on their progress to avoid losing a quarter of the full allocation.

However, the extra £1.6bn is a tiny amount compared with the £17bn the Asphalt Industry Alliance says is required to fill the backlog of repairs. In a report it released last week, it said that half of the local roads in England and Wales – equivalent to 106,000 miles – had less than 15 years’ life left, and of these, 34,600 miles have only five years left in them.

The Department of Transport said that the £1.6bn road maintenance fund includes an extra £500 million for pothole repair. However for context, Cambridgeshire Council alone faces a shortfall of £410m to fix its roads. 

In a statement, the DfT said: “to get the full amount, all councils in England must from today (24 March 2025) publish annual progress reports and prove public confidence in their work. Local authorities who fail to meet these strict conditions will see 25% of the uplift (£125 million in total) withheld.”

However, as one official explained, merely filling potholes isn’t a long term fix. Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, leader of Cambridgeshire County Council, Lucy Nethsingha, said: “Our roads are like a worn out pair of trousers, you can keep fixing the holes, but what you actually need is a new pair of trousers – or in this case a proper resurfacing.”

By the end of June 2025, councils must detail on their websites how much they’re spending, how many potholes they have filled, what percentage of their roads are in what condition, and how they are minimising disruption.

They will also need to show how they are spending more in long-term preventative programmes and have plans to counter increasingly wetter winters, which can quicken the appearance of potholes. By the end of October, they must show they are listening to feedback from the local community by reporting potholes online.

Nethsingha said that the funding is “nowhere near the amount that is needed,” and today’s announcement implies that local authorities are not spending well. It is understood that funding withheld from councils which fail to comply will be reallocated to those which do. 

“It's not clear that there is extra money coming as a result of this announcement. There’s extra red tape and I don't think that's going to be helpful,” Nethsingha said.

The transport secretary, Heidi Alexander, said: "After years of neglect we’re tackling the pothole plague, building vital roads and ensuring every penny is delivering results for the taxpayer.”

However, shadow transport secretary Gareth Bacon said the announcement was a "pothole sticking plaster", and Liberal Democrat transport spokesman Paul Kohler wants a "more sustainable approach" to solve a "crumbling road infrastructure".

According to the breakdown provider the RAC, drivers in England and Wales encounter an average of six potholes per mile, and repair bills due to pothole damage costs on average £600 to fix. The AA said that 96% of drivers say that fixing potholes is a priority.

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