REVEALED: Highland Council failed to fund road maintenance since 2018 by £90 million as it admits not meeting the minimum spend by around £13m this year
Highland Council has admitted for the first time that it has failed to fully fund road maintenance at a level that prevents significant deterioration.
New figures reveal that the average annual shortfall is around £13 million – and in the last five years the total shortfall has ranged from at least £61 million to more than £73 million.
A Freedom of Information request revealed the minimum amount needed to invest in roads – dubbed the steady state or standstill figure – is just under £34 million.
That is the 2023 figure and prior to that the steady state was £25 million as far back as 2019; the year before that it was £17 million, meaning it has doubled in five years.
For years council officers have warned that investment “falls short of the budget requirements to maintain a steady state condition”.
The council now admits that: “At present, the council is not meeting the steady state level of investment for carriageways alone.”
Between 2021-22 and 2026-27, the council budgeted between £20.5 million and £21.6 million – a shortfall of between £12.5 to £13.5 million a year.
But things get worse if you look at the actual spend compared to the budget by the council on roads, which falls even further short of the minimum.
In 2021-22, assuming a steady state figure of £34 million, the shortfall was £18 million; in 2022-23 when we know the steady state was £34 million, it was £15 million.
The level of underinvestment can be approximately calculated by comparing the actual underspend (2021-2023) with the budgeted underspend to April 2025 – that totals £73.3 million. Since 2018 to it is around
But councillors have for the last five years agreed budgets that amount to £61.9 million in the full knowledge that roads would deteriorate.
Below is a table containing the figures though the final spend in some years is unavailable:
The steady state figure has been a bone of contention for years as the local authority has always appeared reluctant to confirm it and even kept the 2023 figure private.
That secrecy over something as apparent as road condition has stoked the already widespread public anger and frustration at the state of the roads.
In May, we revealed Scottish Government numbers show Highland Council has the fifth worst network in the country with 39 per cent of roads in a poor condition.
In that report, campaigners estimated the actual shortfall to be around £10 million but that was based on the previously known figure of around £25 million.
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The council explained that: “Scottish Collaboration of Transportation Specialists (SCOTS) carry out steady state calculations for carriageways which are completed every two years. This was last carried out in 2023 when the steady state figure was £33,990,000.
“The ‘steady state’ figure referenced in reports pertains specifically to carriageway maintenance. At present, the council is not meeting the steady state level of investment for carriageways alone.
“Highland Council has not calculated the precise shortfall between the current road maintenance budget and the estimated funding required to maintain the road network in a steady state condition.
“However, it is acknowledged that the level of investment currently available does not meet the full requirements for sustaining the network. This is reflected in statements included in Area Roads Capital Programme reports.
“While exact figures are not available, it is important to note that Highland Council has significantly increased its investment in road maintenance in recent years compared to historical levels.
“Nonetheless, like many local authorities, the council continues to face ongoing budgetary pressures that impact its ability to fully meet infrastructure maintenance needs.”
Caithness Roads Recovery (CRR) co-founder Iain Gregory said: “For over four years, CRR has said – with complete accuracy – that the annual level of capital investment in the Highland Council roads network falls drastically short of the sum required to simply maintain the ‘steady state’ – in other words, to make sure that things do not get any worse, if indeed such a situation can be imagined.
“From day one, CRR has maintained, and continues to maintain, that we require absolute transparency from Highland Council as to just how bad things really are.
“No matter how many ‘reassuring’ media releases are issued, no matter how many times we are told that the budget has been increased, and no matter how many times we are told of ‘major investment plans’, the fact remains that the situation in Caithness remains utterly dire – roads are collapsing, junctions are unmarked, road signs are falling down, and the reality, faced daily by the public, is now nothing more than disgraceful.
“In 2023, MSP Rhoda Grant submitted an FOI request, seeking to obtain the estimated cost of putting things right across Highland, and was advised that the sum was no less than £233 million. That figure today will be more like £244 million, a sum which will be growing by the day.
“Do Highland Council have this level of funding available? No, they do not. Can the situation be put right without intervention and a huge capital investment by the government? No it cannot, and it is long past time that this was publicly acknowledged by the Highland Council, followed by strong representation to Holyrood to sort this out once and for all. CRR have pursued the matter for years.”
