@ Irongut - £200m to fix potholes
I agree, it's not going to help that much, especially when there's a lot more coming up after the flooding due to washed out foundations down here in the south.
I also get the feeling that roadworks get exploited by the companies hired to do so, as there seems to be very little quality control by the council. On my way to work is a stretch of road that has about a dozen potholes that get filled in about every other month. 1 day to set up the health and safety perimeter with barriers, traffic lights and warning signs, 1 day to take the whole gubbins down again, and about 90 minutes in between that for stomping one bucket of grid into the hole*. I'm sure that it isn't checked for quality by anyone of the people responsible for the payment of the comany **. They just get complaints, sent someone with a goldfish memory to have a look ("Yup, a hole.") and trigger a repair order. It surely would be cheaper if it would be repaired properly once, than year-in-year-out (pat/bot)ched again and again.
While it's nice to see people in employment, if other county councils also work like this, 200m won't go far.
* "Oi, Kev, don't hammer it down that hard, it only needs to last for six weeks, and it's tea break anyway."
**Probably his cousin, or golf mate or something.