MORE than 10,000 potholes have been filled across Fife over the past year but there's still room for improvement on the roads.

The council's transport spokesperson, Councillor Altany Craik, said there was still some way to go although performance levels had gone up in 2023-24.

In February the local authority agreed their budget with an additional £3.5m to spend on fixing the roads.

He was responding to a question from Cllr Sarah Neal who had asked: "How many potholes assessed as grade 2 have been repaired within five days in the past six months and how many have not been repaired within five days in the past six months?"

At the full council meeting Cllr Craik said that 3,565 potholes categorised as priority two defects were repaired between September 1, 2023 and March 8, 2024.

Dunfermline Press: Labour councillor and transport spokesperson, Altany Craik, said: We are making progress, maybe not as fast as we would all like ...Labour councillor and transport spokesperson, Altany Craik, said: We are making progress, maybe not as fast as we would all like ... (Image: Fife Council)

Cllr Neal had then enquired: "When will the citizens of Fife see an improvement in the roads?"

He replied: "At the risk of being trite I would say that is an improvement.

"If I can give you some more detail to give you some comfort, as I think it's important we address the situation with our potholes.

"In 2023-24 there were 10,732 jobs completed, an additional 1,458 from the year before, 67,474 metres of patching were done, which was up by 20 per cent from the year before.

"In terms of getting better performance, and we have scrutiny committees that may want to have a look at this as we go forward, a drop in performance over the winter period is not unusual and it is seasonal."

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Cllr Craik explained: "We use our staff for many other tasks at the same time, whether that's flooding, we have diversion of workforce for winter gritting, we have reduced winter working hours because it gets darker earlier and there's an increase in level repairs due to the weather, that's why we have a bump.

"But the lack of repair materials, sometimes the quarries are closed over the Christmas period, it is difficult to reach all of those repairs within the timescale.

"We have had discussions with the head of transportation about how we can be slicker and cleverer with the processes, because that is ultimately what drives the performance.

"So we are making progress, maybe not as fast as we would all like and we would all like to see it better."