Mobile working for councils: pity the potholes

Potholes seem to be never far from the news these days – and it’s not surprising, given their number. According to Confused.com, in 2017/18 more than 905,000 potholes were reported on UK roads. In addition, thanks to the rise of social media, photos of the more eye-catching or vexing ones are often shared on local Facebook groups, often accompanied by memes of people being submerged up to their necks in them.

On a more serious note, a House of Commons Transport Committee report – ‘Local roads funding and maintenance: filling the gap’ – perhaps somewhat obviously, given its title, says “the key issue is funding – there is not enough of it and what there is, is not allocated efficiently or effectively”. A similar point was made recently by the Local Government Association, which states that the amount of money councils have been able to spend on routine road maintenance fell from £1.1bn in 2009/10 to around £701m in 2017/18 – a 37 per cent reduction – and that the missing funds could have covered the cost of repairing 7.8 million potholes.