Gideon Amos
Main Page: Gideon Amos (Liberal Democrat - Taunton and Wellington)Department Debates - View all Gideon Amos's debates with the HM Treasury
(1 day, 11 hours ago)
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Gideon Amos (Taunton and Wellington) (LD)
I congratulate the hon. Member for South Shropshire (Stuart Anderson) on securing this debate. This has been a year of records for Taunton, Somerset and the Somerset levels: the Environment Agency reported the wettest week on record for at least 30 years, and in January, the River Tone and the River Parrett received 207% of the long-term average for January rainfall.
The result of that was a massive and record reporting of potholes. One Blagdon Hill resident pointed out to us that the problem goes back 10 years to the period when the Conservatives running the county council reduced funding for highways. At the same time, the Government have reduced Somerset’s funding by removing the remoteness uplift of £20 million per year. The record I want to finish my speech on is that the council has just approved £160 million to be spent over the next three years on highways and potholes. That is a record amount, and at no other time have so many potholes been filled by Liberal Democrat councillors.