Perils On Roads

The Chair of a Kent County Council Highways Committee recently missed the start of a meeting because he was delayed when his car was damaged by a pothole.

The irony was lost on no one. Sean Holden, who chairs KCC's scrutiny committee for highways, missed the start of the January 14 meeting after his BMW smacked a sharp-edged, four inch deep pothole and punctured his tyre.

Anyone who has listened to Cllr Holden, Conservative member for Cranbrook, will know he is not short of opinions about the state of the county’s roads.

He also has the rare distinction of achieving cross-party support for an inspectorate to monitor the road work-related highway closures – often to repair potholes – that seem to bedevil every community in Kent.

When Cllr Holden eventually made his way to County Hall, a hundred quid lighter and seriously inconvenienced, the incident seemed to tickle his Tory colleague, Harry Rayner, no end.

But the councillor’s story will be a familiar one to anyone whose car has been damaged by Kent’s crumbling roads.

Cllr Holden had been making his way along Hareplain Road, near Frittenden, at around 40mph and was forced into a long, wide and deep pothole when a van came racing along in the opposite direction.

He said: “The hole was stretched about a third of the way across the road, which is something of a rat run, and is about ten yards long and several inches deep.

“Crucially, it had a near vertical end and that’s always what does the damage. Because there was a big van coming the other way, I couldn’t avoid it.

“There was a huge bang and the dashboard told me the nearside tyre was deflating rapidly.”

Cllr Holden has asked for the pothole to be fixed to prevent another similar accident and he genuinely fears for the safety of motorists, particularly motorcyclists and cyclists.

“No one has missed the irony of my being the chairman of the very committee which asks the tough questions of the highways department ending up in a pothole,” he added.

“My real worry is that potholed roads are a lurking disaster for road users, particularly motorcyclists who are very vulnerable on the roads.”
Cllr Holden recognises there are growing pressures on the county’s roads, not least house building adding to the volume of traffic and the estimated 11,000 lorries which trundle along them each day.

But on the smaller back roads, he wonders if huge tractors towing multi-tonne loads are to blame, in part, to the degradation of the surface.

KCC’s highways department will contend, with some justification, that it fights a constant, year-round uphill battle to keep on top of the problem, starved of enough funds from central government to do so.

Kent is far from alone. The Automobile Association (AA) released figures recently which showed the UK bill for affected vehicles in 2024 was £579m – up £105m on the previous year.

These days, KCC rarely pays out on more than one in ten claims for damage compensation.

In fact, in all of 2023 there were 1,891 claims of which 147 (8%) were accepted at an average of £206. Of the 1,202 claims received in 2024, all but 81 have been assessed, with 97 successful so far at an average pay out of £193.

The AA, however, notes the average repair bills have jumped from £250 (2023) to £300 (2024).

A KCC spokesman said: “Under the Highways Act, if we can show we have inspected the roads and responded to defects within a reasonable period of time, the majority of claims should be defendable.”

James Rolfe, manager at the Maidstone Exhaust Service Centre, says its sister company Bower Lane Tyres has seen an increase in pothole related business in recent years.

Mr Rolfe added:  “The damage caused by potholes can be tyre bulges, blow outs and even suspension or exhaust systems being affected.

“Any component that moves takes an impact when it goes down a pothole. The council doesn’t seem particularly quick to act on them. People pay their taxes but when they go to claim (compensation), it’s not there.”

Potholes form when water seeps into fissures in the road surface and is repeatedly frozen and thawed, causing the structure to crumble.

Nationally, the number of pothole cases dropped slightly year on year from 647,000 (2023) to 643,000 (2024), according to the AA.

Bizarre as it seems, Britain now has a National Pothole Day (January 15 this year) and a lobbying organisation called the Pothole Partnership such is the widespread concern to the issue.

The partnership comprises the AA, National Motorcyclists’ Council, British Cycling, IAM RoadSmart, the British Motorcyclists’ Federation and pothole fixing machine makers, JCB.

Far from being a celebration, National Pothole Day is an event borne out of increasing concerns and supported by many august bodies, including the Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation (CIHT) charity.

CIHT welcomed the government’s recent £1.6bn funding allocation for filling potholes and fixing roads, of which £322m will go to London and the south east.

Just before Christmas Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, said:  “Broken roads can risk lives and cost families hundreds if not thousands of pounds on repairs. That’s a cost that can easily be avoided by investing properly in our roads.

“That’s why we’re giving councils funding to repair our roads and get Britain moving again – with a clear expectation that they get on with the job.

Fixing potholes on the county’s 5,000 miles of road is a constant struggle, although KCC does appear to be making progress.

Motoring organisation RAC figures estimate there are six potholes, on average, for every mile of road in England and Wales, while 96% of AA members believe that fixing them is a priority of drivers.

In Kent, more investment and the use of better and more advanced technology has helped to bring a reduction in the number of potholes.

The KCC cabinet member for highways, Cllr Neil Baker, does not shy away from the fact the numbers still remain “exceptionally high” which would require a massive injection of funds from central government.

There were more than 35,000 reports of potholes in the 2023/24 financial year with a repair cost of £15m.

In the current 2024/25 financial year, reports stand as of mid-January, at more than 14,000 and the cost of fixing them sitting at £10m plus.

Cllr Baker says: “Potholes are the endpoint of a failing road and the amount spent on repairing them is just part of the more than £50million invested in road maintenance each year.

“Ideally, we would be able to invest a significant amount more in proactive road maintenance, resurfacing and rebuilding to reduce the number of potholes that require attention.

“The number of defects reported on our roads remains exceptionally high and to start turning the corner, I’d like to see a dramatic increase in highway funding from central government, which reflects the heavy usage of roads in Kent instead of just the number of miles of road, and a multi-year financial package offered.

“This would allow us to resurface and rebuild roads according to a programme laid out over decades, rather than just highlighting the number of potholes we need to fix.”

The £1.6bn funding boost to councils was welcomed by Cllr Baker but he remains sceptical but feels hope that Kent’s anticipated new system of local government may herald a “brave new world”.

He added: “However, despite the headlines and soundbites, I must note it falls short of that needed to maintain our roads and other highways assets to the level we want, let alone tackling the maintenance backlog.

“As we move towards devolution and local government reform in Kent, albeit at a timescale currently unclear, I do hope part of this brave, new world involves whoever looks after our highways being in a position to plan over a long-term period, with genuinely adequate funds, to ensure we keep our economy growing and people in Kent moving about their lives, in a way they deserve and expect.”