A new report on Scottish local authority finances has found that continued budget restriction has resulted in 20% reduction in spending on road maintenance. The research was compiled by the Local Government Benchmarking Framework (LGBF) that brings together annual data on Scottish councils’ performance.
The significant fall underlines the problem of ongoing cuts to local government funding that are forcing councils to raid highway budgets in order to fund their social care responsibilities. The LGBF research shows that overall government funding for Scottish councils has fallen by 7.6% in real terms, from £10.5bn to £9.7bn.
The latest findings follows calculations from the Society of Chief Officers of Transportation in Scotland (SCOTS) that the existing backlog of repairs to Scotland’s road networks is valued at £1.6bn.
Despite the drop in funding, the LGBF report found a “slight improvement” in the overall condition of Scottish roads. Over the last year C class and unclassified roads have improved, B roads have remained constant and ‘A’ roads continue to decline. This is attributed to improvements in efficiency and innovation.
Commenting on the report, Howard Robinson, chief executive of the Road Surface Treatments Association (RSTA) said: “The local road network is a council’s most important asset yet they are forced to ransack their highways budget to fund other services. Robbing Peter to pay Paul is not the best way forward.
Whilst there has been a slight improvement in road conditions, the size of the £1.6bn backlog of pothole repairs together with ever increasing traffic demands means that the condition of the road network will continue to cause concern. Efficiency improvements can only go so far without proper investment in road maintenance.”