CASH from a pothole “action” fund will pay to fill in 58,039 potholes in the North-East and 30,887 in North Yorkshire, the Government says.

Councils in the North-East will receive a share of £3m as part of a £250m fund announced in Chancellor George Osborne’s budget, while North Yorkshire County gets £1.6m.

While the allocation was welcomed by some local authorities, it represents a drop in the ocean in terms of the half-a-billion pounds figure a road industry survey last month claimed was needed to patch up North-East roads.

The biggest share in the North-East is taken by the unitary Durham County Council, which will receive £784,000 from the Government in 2016/17.

The Government also said it was spending a record £6.1bn nationwide on local highways maintenance between 2015/16 and 2020/21, giving councils long-term certainty for the first time to plan future work with the aim of preventing potholes and improving local roads, bridges and street lighting.

Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin said the pothole action fund was just one part of “unprecedented” investment in local road maintenance.

Councillor Don Mackenzie, North Yorkshire County Council’s executive member for highways, said: “All funding is welcome and will form part of our continuing investment in maintaining and improving the condition of our road network.”

However he added: “We do still face a substantial backlog in our highway maintenance programme.”

John Reed, head of technical services at Durham County Council, said: “We welcome this additional funding of £784,000 which will supplement our 2016/17 highway maintenance budget of £26m.

“However, like most councils we have a highway maintenance backlog - currently £180 million - so funding of highway maintenance remains a significant challenge for the council.”