Caravanners planning a winter break this year may have to contend with more potholes in the road, as a recent survey has found that 80 per cent of UK councils have seen their road maintenance budget shrink in real terms.
Some 55 per cent of the 20 UK councils questioned in the RAC study have seen an outright reduction in their funding, the Daily Telegraph reported.
With inflation meaning that costs of the materials used to repair roads as well as the labour used to do the work have increased, even the 25 per cent of councils who said funding had stayed the same have in reality seen their budgets decrease.
One council spokesman told the newspaper: ”The reduction in capital spend has reduced the ability of the county council to continue with the on-going improvement in roads condition.”
It’s not all bad news, however. Despite constraints on their budgets, half of councils said they were still focusing on long-term fixes instead of short-term repairs, a rise of ten per cent from six months ago.
