Bexley Council has insisted it is in an “exceptionally good position” when comparing its roads to others across the country while the local MP has criticised the authority for its pothole repair work. The Conservative-controlled council continues to butt heads with the Labour Bexleyheath and Crayford MP Daniel Francis over the condition of the borough’s roads.
Both sides highlight different measures and statistics to claim the opposite, with Bexley Council insisting it is expected to spend more than it was allocated by the Government and in its own budget for potholes this financial year. Meanwhile Mr Francis claims the council is in a race against time to spend the funding before the end of the financial year because it’s been lacklustre in its repairs programme up until now.
The battle between the two reached Parliament last October, with Prime Minister Keir Starmer saying Bexley Council might lose Department for Transport funding if the authority didn’t maintain its highways.
Credit: Bexley Council.
Bexley Council Leader David Leaf sent a letter to the PM days later asking for assurances that Bexley’s funding would not be cut and for him to correct the record on what it viewed to be misinformation presented by Mr Francis in Parliament. Cllr Leaf has still not received a response to his letter.
The confrontation between the council and the MP reared its head again this week at a meeting of the council’s Cabinet on January 26. While the Cabinet was discussing the council’s budget, Cllr Richard Diment confirmed the council would be overspending on this year’s road maintenance budget in order to ensure Bexley’s roadways were looked after.
Cllr Diment said: “Of the £895,000 that we were allocated by the Department for Transport for this year, we have now issued instructions totalling £919,000 to our contractors for maintenance work.”
He also confirmed that including the £4.96m Bexley had allocated for road maintenance in its annual budget, the council had issued instructions to its contractor to use £5.4m.
He said: “The slight increase over budget is to allow for any potential slippage there might be due to poor weather or, [as is] increasingly the problem unfortunately as we all see as we move around Bexley, are sudden emergency road repairs by the utilities which result in work being delayed.”
Cllr Diment said that if all those instructions are carried out this financial year and there is an overspend, money can be brought forward from next year’s budget to meet the difference. He added: “We are well on target to achieve total expenditure, which is one of the reasons of course why we got a green on our spend scorecard in the Department for Transport local road maintenance ratings.”
Cllr Diment also drew attention to the fact that Bexley also achieved a green rating on the condition scorecard, one of only 26 authorities to do so. According to the councillor’s calculations, Bexley was also the seventh highest performing council in the country when it came to the average combined score of the conditions of its A, B, C and U roads, something he called “extremely good news”.
He added: “Those who want to talk down Bexley and say that it’s not in a good condition, I think this is a clear indicator that actually relative, not just to our neighbours, the rest of London and indeed most of England, we are in an exceptionally good position.”
Bexley Council Leader David Leaf said: “I think it is important that clarity is given, that people understand the facts and not the spin and the rhetoric.”
The council leader also had some choice words for Mr Francis, stating: “What was also disappointing when this was raised in Parliament is that the attention-seeking Member of Parliament who raised this didn’t have the courtesy to thank our officers or our contractors and operatives for the work that they do, keeping those roads in a good condition. We appreciate and respect their work which is why we are investing heavily in this area.”
Bexley residents were also praised by the Cabinet for the “sterling work” they do being the council’s “eyes and ears” when flagging road defects on the FixMyStreet website.
In response to the council leader’s comments, Daniel Francis MP said: “It’s disappointing, but not surprising, that Bexley’s Conservative Cabinet members chose to continue their obsession of spending time disparaging me, rather than deal with spending the Government’s funds to fill potholes.
“The papers presented to them at the meeting showed that they had spent 25 per cent of the DfT pothole recovery funding and 53 per cent of their own Highways Maintenance funding in the first 67 per cent of the financial year.
“Conservative Councillors, unfortunately, continue deflecting to try to avert attention from the fact that they are in a race against the clock to spend funds during the worst weather conditions of the year, due to their lack of progress throughout summer and autumn.
“They also continue to deflect from the fact that the Department for Transport gave them an amber rating regarding how well it is maintaining local roads and using increased government funding.
“The figures published by the Department for Transport earlier this month show that, in terms of ranking, the borough’s A roads are 72nd across all councils across the country, while Conservative Councillors continue with their unsubstantiated claim that they have the seventh best roads in the country.
Credit: Bexley Council.
“In doing so, they continue to gaslight our residents as their own figures, published on the council’s website, show a significant deterioration in the roads since their decision to slash road maintenance budgets in 2021.
“Like many residents, I am fully aware of how much work remains to be done. I have passed on numerous concerns from residents to the council on the condition of our roads, including cases where potholes were not repaired within the agreed timeframe or where initial reports were closed prematurely, only for the council to later accept that the potholes did meet the criteria for repair.”
Cllr Leaf also had a response for the MP’s statement. He said: “Data published by the Government shows the condition of the roads in Bexley to be scoring amongst the best in the country with a Green rating, but we know there is always more to do.
“This is why our budget plans for 2026/27 and over the next four years puts millions of pounds of new funding into fixing potholes, keeping our roads and pavements in safe conditions, and repairing, resurfacing and restructuring our highways. We are grateful to our staff and contractors for the work they do keeping our roads safe, including repairing around 2,500 potholes a year and undertaking major works on around 300 roads in the last five years, and our residents who report issues to us.
“At this time of the year, we are also navigating the disruption to our roads network caused by significant numbers of utilities works being undertaken, which Thames Water and other companies are responsible for.
“Instead of trying to pick political fights to grab attention and then complaining when his misleading claims are corrected, Mr Francis should be thanking our staff and contractors for the work they do.
“His time would also be better spent by joining us in lobbying his friends in the Labour Government to reverse the cuts they are imposing on Bexley’s grant funding and the cuts to highways funding that Sadiq Khan has imposed on us since he was elected.”
