Nottinghamshire County Council's leader says the idea that £20 million would fix the area's roads is "for the birds." Ben Bradley says £200 million would probably be needed to bring all of Nottinghamshire's roads up to standard.
The leader of the Conservative-controlled authority was speaking after its annual budget meeting, which saw an amendment rejected pledging to invest £20.5 million into Nottinghamshire's roads. The Independent Alliance group of councillors said it would have funded this investment partially by cancelling the investment in new Top Wighay offices.
Conservative councillors had accused the Independent Alliance of a "gimmick." But speaking during the budget meeting on Thursday (February 9), independent councillor Francis Purdue-Horan said: "If a gimmick invests in our broken roads and pavements, if a gimmick invests in the highways infrastructure, if a gimmick invests in our community, then I will choose this responsible, positive choice."
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But speaking about the proposed investment, Councillor Ben Bradley told Nottinghamshire Live: "The idea that £20 million would fix anything is for the birds. Truth be told, if we wanted to do the best possible job we could we'd want £200 million.
"£20 million isn't going to give us the ability to control the weather either, which is the biggest cause of recent damage. It's a bit disingenuous to suggest to residents that there is a silver bullet for the roads."
It comes after Nottinghamshire County Council commissioned a cross-party review of highways in the summer of 2021 to look at the way in which roads were repaired. The authority said it aimed to move towards a "right-first time approach" where roads were resurfaced instead of potholes being temporarily filled.
The council said at the end of last year that the use of Viafix to temporarily fill potholes had decreased by 61 percent, with the number of pothole complaints also falling. But some opposition councillors say several roads in their area are still in a poor state, with the council saying it doesn't hold information on how often it is revisiting a pothole after first repairing it.
During Thursday's budget meeting, many even labelled Councillor Neil Clarke, the Cabinet Member for Transport, the "cabinet member for broken roads." Councillor Clarke twice raised a point of clarification to say that he was not the cabinet member for broken roads.
Ben Bradley added: "We all know that things will take time. The previous administration put an extra £24 million into the roads, but they didn’t improve the systems and as a result the roads got no better.
"We can all decide to chuck money at things, but the point of the highways review is to get the system and process right." The Independent Alliance amendment to the budget was rejected, with 14 votes in favour and 46 votes against it.
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