Cash for councils in the East of England to fill 136,000 potholes

Eleven councils in the East of England will receive a share of £7.2 million, helping to remove around 136,000 potholes from local roads during this financial year. The funding has been made available as part of the £250 million Pothole Action Fund included in last month’s Budget, which will fix over four million potholes by 2020/21.

Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin said: “I know how important well-maintained roads are to people across the East of England. Almost every journey starts and ends on a local road, so the government is giving councils in the region £7.2 million specifically to tackle the blight of potholes in their area.

“This is just one part of our unprecedented investment in local road maintenance over the next five years. We are giving a record £644 million to local authorities in the East of England that will improve journeys across the region.”

In total, the government is spending a record £6.1 billion nationwide on local highways maintenance between 2015/16 and 2020/21, giving councils long-term certainty for the first time to plan future work with the aim of preventing potholes and improving local roads, bridges and street lighting.

As part of this investment, the Pothole Action Fund will give local authorities in England £50 million a year, over the next 5 years, to help them tackle more than four million potholes. Funding is calculated according to the size of the local road network in the area.

Source: Department for Transport

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