DfT prevents good road maintenance with "ludicrous" stop-start funding - MPs

The influential Commons public accounts committee says the DfT has made it "difficult for highways authorities to maintain roads cost-effectively" because of "intermittent" funding allocations.

Margaret Hodge, chair of the committee, publishing a new report, said: "It seems ludicrous that in 2010 the Department cut road maintenance by £1.2bn over the four years from April 2011, but then intermittently gave £1.1bn additional funding on nine separate occasions for various reasons, including in response to flooding or winter damage."

"The Department must see that prevention is better than cure... Infrastructure UK says that savings of 10-20% are associated with certainty of funding."

The MPs challenged the DfT to not repeat this way of announcing funding and stick to the capital allocations for local authorities it has set out for the six years from spring 2015 - when a new Government will have formed - so the supply chain can plan the work confidently and efficiently.

They also criticised the Highways Maintenance Efficiency Programme for being "insufficiently targeted at assisting poor-performing authorities," such as the 45 across England that have no completed asset management plan; challenged authorities to better spread work throughout the year and to "anticipate and prevent disrepair" by collecting and using information on their highway networks.