A FAIRER funding system is required before Dumfries and Galloway can ever bring its road network up to a good standard, according to one councillor.
The council is halfway through a four-year £30m capital roads investment plan – but this only scratches the surface of the repairs needed.
Eighteen months ago the region’s roads maintenance backlog stood at £254m, with almost half of the entire public road network falling into either red or amber categories needing treatment.
Lochar Councillor Linda Dorward has this week argued that Dumfries and Galloway doesn’t receive a fair share of government funding to properly address this ongoing problem.
She said: “It can’t have escaped the attention of any local politician that via email, phone call, letter, community council meetings and face to face encounters, the biggest concern of Dumfries and Galloway citizens is the continuing poor state of our roads, the cost of potholes to car owners and the perceived lack of lasting, long-term maintenance solutions.
“Our entire carriageway is valued at £3.8 billion, and the roads of Dumfries and Galloway are described as the council’s ‘largest and most financially valuable physical asset’ Yet in 2023 the cost of our maintenance backlog was in excess of £254m and according to the 2022 National Road Condition survey Dumfries and Galloway had the second highest percentage of crumbling roads in Scotland.”
One third of Scotland’s road network is accounted for by Highland, Aberdeenshire and Dumfries and Galloway councils.
Dumfries and Galloway has the third biggest road network, accounting for eight percent of the road total and is responsible for 4202km of roads. “But we don’t get the third biggest funding pot,” said Councillor Dorward. “Why is that? It’s due to a road funding formula that favours the Central Belt as it includes a calculation that uses ‘physical road length multiplied by number of lanes’.
“Rural local authorities, including Dumfries and Galloway, have a much higher proportion of single-track roads. Maintenance on every road includes surface upkeep, ditch clearing, bridge repairs, signage and marking.”
Councillor Dorward will table a motion at today’s council meeting on behalf of the Labour Group which will call on council leader Gail Macgregor to write to the Scottish Government to review the funding formula for roads repairs.
