Over the last financial year Wokingham Borough Council received more than £1 million in extra money form the Government for road maintenance.
Wokingham’s Liberal Democrats did not increase the Council’s capital budget for road maintenance.
The result of this real terms cut, over the last two years during a period of high inflation, is that there has been an obvious reduction in the quality of road repairs in the Borough.
Most people travel by road whether you’re driving, catching the bus, or cycling, and potholes can cause misery from expensive vehicle repairs to bumpy, slow, and dangerous journeys – damaged roads are especially unsafe for cyclists and a trip hazard for pedestrians.
Alongside the Liberal Democrats’ doubling of car parking charges, with further increases this year particularly at our country parks, people might think that the Liberal Democrats are anti-car.
In the first year they took over the Council, the Liberal Democrats in partnership with Labour reduced the spending on fixing potholes, as they admitted in their own Revenue Monitoring Report in January 2023.
In the last four years that the Conservatives ran the Council, we doubled the spending on road maintenance.
Under the previous Conservative administration 2018 Budget, £3.8 million was budgeted, this was made up of £2.28 million earmarked under “Highways Carriageways Structural Maintenance” and £1.5 million set for fixing potholes. By 2022, the budget had increased to £6.5 million.
Residents would certainly be within their rights to question why, with all this extra money they have extracted from the Borough’s hard-pressed motorists, alongside the additional money from the Government, what the Liberal Democrats are actually spending this money on – because it’s clearly not on fixing roads.
It’s certainly worth bearing in mind next time you hear the Liberal Democrats proclaiming that it’s all the Government’s fault.
Wokingham Borough is a partly rural area.
While we have some towns, we have many communities clustered in villages that don’t have reliable public transport links.
At the same time, there are many people who aren’t as able-bodied; who can’t cycle, or walk long distances, or even make a short trip to the bus stop. For them, a car is not a choice, it’s a lifeline, that allows them independence and freedom.
For whatever reason, many residents rely on their cars. They are rightly frustrated and fed up with the Liberal Democrats’ lack of investment in their priorities.
A Conservative-run Council would change this. If we are elected on May 2, we will increase spending on road repairs, and renew the focus on reducing congestion. We’ll repair more residential roads that have been neglected in the past. And we’ll get the balance right between sustainable transport, pedestrians and other road users, bidding for more grants with an aim to repair more pavements, to ensure all residents are supported in their choice of transport.
You deserve better than the deal you’re getting with the Liberal Democrats.
Vote Conservative on May 2 to get a Council that listens to you and delivers on your priorities.
Cllr Pauline Jorgensen is the leader of Wokingham Conservatives and standing for election in Hillside
