Council £50m pledge to fix potholed roads

MORE than £50 million has been allocated towards mending Oxfordshire’s roads.

The county council agreed a £646million budget for 2025/26 at a meeting on Tuesday.

This means the council’s share of council tax will rise by 4.99 per cent from April 1.

After a day of proposals from all parties, a compromise was reached between the budget proposed by the ruling Liberal Democrats and Greens with amendments put forward by Labour.

In the autumn, the council had said that it would face a £25 million funding shortfall. This has been addressed thanks to new money allocated to local government combined with local cutbacks and the tax increase.

A total of two per cent of the increase is earmarked for adult social care.

More money will go towards promoting active travel measures. Another £3.6 million has also been allocated to improve responsiveness to flooding and an extra £1.5 million for highway drainage.

The council has also agreed to clean and maintain the drainage gullies along roads annually rather than every four years.

It will also put more money into early years support for children under five and support for those with special educational needs.

Dan Levy, cabinet member for finance, said that while he was pleased to be able to support services residents relied on, it was difficult for the council to look further than next year.

He said: “We are pleased to be able to spend more on important services that people value ranging from adult social care for children and adults to highway maintenance There is lots of good news for people all over the county and from all backgrounds.

“This is all in the context of us carefully and responsibly managing the council’s finances and making efficiency savings where and when we can.”

Henley’s county councillor Stefan Gawrysiak said: “The good thing about the budget is that central government put a lot of money in so we are putting £50 million into the roads this year, which is a record. That is seriously good news.”

The Labour amendments that were accepted by the ruling group included additional investment in breakfast clubs at schools, the development of a business case for greenway cross-country cycle routes, and finance to transform libraries into community hubs.