Derbyshire highways chief defends efforts to beat potholes after minister criticises council

Derbyshire County Council’s highways chief has told how the authority is doing everything it can to improve roads with ‘action rather than words’ despite the Labour Government minister Lilian Greenwood’s claim that the Conservative council ‘should hang their heads in shame’ over the condition of the area’s roads.

The Minister for the Future of Roads, Ms Greenwood, visited Whittington, in Chesterfield, on April 11th, to examine potholes around the Holland Road and Prospect Road area in advance of the May 1st county council elections with Labour candidate Allan Ogle for the Staveley North and Whittington division and Chesterfield Labour MP Toby Perkins.

Ms Greenwood claimed Derbyshire is ‘the council with some of the worst roads in England’ and that they have been allowed to deteriorate with piecemeal work by the council instead of permanent repairs and that the local authority ‘should hang their heads in shame’ over the state of the highways.

However, Cllr Cupit, Cabinet Member for Highways Assets and Transport, said: “Sadly, this appears to be more false outrage from the Labour Government rather than actually doing anything to invest in or improve our roads.

“Their practical record of inaction speaks for itself, cutting the roads budget locally last time they were in control at Derbyshire – leading to many of the issues we now see.

“They’ve still not learned as they slashed highways grant funding, last year, when we needed it most in Derbyshire, have axed the longer term £176million we desperately needed and just brought in new form-filling rather than new money.”

Cllr Cupit recently welcomed a share of Government funding towards highways maintenance and potholes – under a nationwide £1.6bn package announced in December to fix potholes – but she stressed there is still a lot more investment needed given the damage to the county’s roads.

Derbyshire is set to benefit from a £37.5m allocation via the new East Midlands Combined County Authority to go on road repairs and it will also benefit from a share of £66m of City Region Sustainable Transport Settlements funding also to be received through EMCCA.

But Cllr Cupit has described the Labour Government’s funding announcement in December as ‘smoke and mirrors’ after she claimed most of this money for Derbyshire reflected a usual maintenance grant and that it does not take into account reduced funding for the county’s roads from the Government in the 2024-25 financial year.

Another consideration is that the Government aims to hold back a quarter of its £500m funding uplift for councils until authorities can demonstrate that funding is being used well.

Ms Greenwood disputed claims the latest funding allocation works out as the same or less as ‘absolute nonsense’ and she argued holding back some funding until councils show it can be well used ensures money will be spent well.

Ms Greenwood said Derbyshire is known to be one of the worst roads in England and the former Conservative Government had not invested enough in local roads,  allowing them to deteriorate into a ‘sorry state’ which is why she said the Labour Government is investing £1.6bn to fix potholes and maintain highways.

The Nottingham South Labour MP, Ms Greenwood, said: “It is the number one issue people raise about transport and that is why we are investing £1.6bn.”

She added that last year the county council got just short of £27m and this year it has got an extra £10m with £37.5m to be allocated to the area.

Ms Greenwood said: “It’s a 40 per cent uplift on last year so we would hope that with that money they would get to grips but the approach they take is to do tiny patch repairs, that are not up to scratch, and that is one of the reasons as a Government we are giving a substantial uplift.”

She argued the council had carried out patch-and-mend, piecemeal repairs instead of long-term preventative measures and when there is poor infrastructure it is a barrier to growth.

Ms Greenwood added: “It is shocking to see the state of the roads in Whittington, but it will be of no shock to the residents who live here – or those across Derbyshire facing this scale of disrepair every day.

“The Tory-run county council should hang their heads in shame. If Labour take over the authority come May 1, our councillors will work hand-in-hand with this Government to ensure the multi-million investment being pumped into the council goes to where it is needed and our roads are fit for the people of Derbyshire once again.”

Chesterfield MP Toby Perkins echoed Ms Greenwood’s concerns that the county council has been doing a ‘patch-up’ job instead of full resurfacing and that some of the roads looked like an ‘archaeological dig’.

Mr Ogle, the Labour candidate for Staveley North and Whittington, conducted his own survey in which 96p er cent of 121 respondents stated they encountered potholes on a daily basis, with 72 per cent saying potholes had damaged their vehicles in the past year, and 27 per cent saying they or someone they knew had suffered an accident or injury due to the state of the roads.

He said: “It’s not even a hazard – it is dangerous – and residents saying they live on a dangerous road is not good enough. We can see how the job could be done significantly better.”

Mr Ogle added that following his survey he claims one of the biggest impacts upon residents has been the added strain to the cost of living with car maintenance problems due to potholes.

He said: “Residents have made it clear – our roads are in an unacceptable state. This issue is affecting people’s safety, their finances, and their confidence in Local Government under its current leadership.

“It is great to see the minister here today who is dedicated to making our roads safer and hearing about all the Government’s plans to improve the streets of Derbyshire.

“It shows the difference Labour makes in power, and I hope the people of Staveley North and Whittington will vote Labour on May 1 so we can see that difference right here.”

East Midlands Labour Party also claims the breakdown and insurance company RAC has dubbed Derbyshire the worst county in the country for potholes, and the RAC recently claimed only a fraction of Derbyshire County Council’s roads received any form of maintenance during 2023-2024.

However, the county council has argued that it has been targeting repairs with high-tech systems and that there is a need for more Government investment.

Cllr Cupit said the council is doing everything it can to invest locally and maximise funding and resources to improve roads and it is trying to focus on permanent and lasting repairs and resurfacing where possible while using new technology and also doing smaller-scale resurfacing of pothole hotspots.

In the last year the council has planned out and resurfaced over 200 pothole hotspots and over the last six months it has done over 3,000 smaller resurfacing patches on over 300 streets across the county, according to Cllr Cupit.

Cllr Cupit said the council will also be carrying out patch resurfacing on at least 500 streets over the next three months on top of its usual large scale road reconstruction and resurfacing and preventative surface-dressing and sealing work.

In May, 2023, the council confirmed it had fixed as many as 42,036 potholes between January and May, 2023, and claimed a national survey revealed the local authority had fixed more potholes than any other highways authority in the country.

Cllr Cupit added: “As local Conservatives, we’ll keep on getting on with the job of improving our roads and focusing on resurfacing and dealing with our roads with all the investment we can.

“This includes a record resurfacing programme locally last year, plans for another record resurfacing year this year, which will see more than 500 streets see resurfacing works over the next three months alone, and using new technologies like the elastic pothole repairs material too. We’ll keep focusing on action rather than words as that’s what actually resurfaces roads.”

Cllr Cupit has previously argued Derbyshire has a diverse geography and a huge highways network with 3,500 miles of road, 2,794 miles of footpaths, 1,182 highways bridges and many other assets, and it has also had to contend with more extreme weather conditions causing potholes, carriageway deterioration and a high number of landslips.

The other candidates for the Staveley North and Whittington division of the county council election include Liberal Democrat Barry Bingham, Chesterfield Independent Rose Clark, Reform UK’s Mark Cliff, Independent Martin Hibbert, Conservative Carolyn Renwick, and the Green Party’s Simon Swift.