We're top of the pots

London is the pothole capital of Britain with almost 30 craters and cracks on every mile of its roads.

A report published today reveals how the daily pounding taken by London's roads has left them in a worse state of repair than those elsewhere in the country.

Outside London there are an estimated 589,000 holes on England's 171,442 miles of road - an average of three per mile.

The capital's 9,123 miles of roads have 258,000 potholes, equivalent to 28 per mile. Repairing them costs London's boroughs £19 million a year, more than a third of the national pothole bill.

The figures are revealed in the Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance Survey, which quizzed highways engineers about repairs and resurfacing. It found that:

The number of defects has soared by up to 87 per cent in the past 10 years (68 per cent in the capital) and cost £56 million in the 2005/06 financial year - enough to pay for 500 miles to be resurfaced.

Claims for compensation cost £50 million as motorists demanded reimbursement for repairs to vehicles damaged by potholes. The bill was £6.7 million in London.

Jim Crick, chairman of the Asphalt Industry Alliance, which conducted the survey with the County Surveyors' Society, said: "The survey reveals no light at the end of the tunnel for road maintenance departments. With a continuing shortfall of funds, the backlog of work can only worsen. Increased funding is the only solution to improving road network condition."

Councils say they spend up to 31 per cent of their roads budgets on repairs, but face a £1 billion shortfall on structural works including resurfacing.

The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents called on the Government to spend more and said poor road surfaces pose a particular danger for motorcyclists and cyclists.

Head of road safety Kevin Clinton said: "The existence of so many potholes on our roads introduces a driving hazard that we could do without."

Cyclists in Haringey have accused the council of failing to meet its own targets for filling in hazardous holes. Of the 66 reported to the council since the start of last month only two have been fixed, claimed the cyclists campaign group CTC.

Haringey council said the real figure was lower, but admitted that bad weather and staff shortages meant not as many holes "as we would have wanted" have been repaired.