Roads: Repairs and Maintenance
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what plans she has to collect data on the frequency of (a) potholes and (b) defects on local roads.
Answered by Simon Lightwood
DfT collects and collates information on the condition of roads from local authorities in England annually. This information is published as official statistics. The latest release of these statistics was in January 2026, which covered data for the financial year ending March 2025. The statistics are published online, at: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/road-conditions-in-england-to-march-2025
In addition, in June 2025 local highway authorities had to publish transparency reports about their maintenance activities to unlock their full share of the Government’s £500 million uplift for local highways maintenance this financial year. These reports included estimates of the number of potholes they have filled in each of the last five years and from now, must be published annually on local highway authorities’ websites. The reports also require local highway authorities to publish data on the condition of their roads and to demonstrate how they comply with best practice in highways maintenance, for example the extent to which they adopt preventative maintenance approaches which keep roads in good condition for longer and prevent potholes from forming in the first place.
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