Transport Secretary hit with £150 repair bill after pothole damages her Mini

Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander has gained first-hand experience of the UK’s pothole blight after striking a ‘crater-like’ example in her Mini Cooper.

The minister faced a bill of £150 for new tyres from her mechanic after driving into the chasm in Oxfordshire last month, Metro understands.

Pictures from the night show her green car being carried away on the back of a truck.

Speaking to the Sun, Alexander said: ‘I joked to my husband that I thought that the astronauts on Artemis II might have seen a similar-size crater when they were slingshotting around the Moon last week.’

She said the incident demonstrated why Labour was determined to make local authorities put in the effort to fix the potholes pocking their roads.

The Mini met its match on the B4437 outside Burford in Oxfordshire, which is covered by a Liberal Democrat-run council.

According to the Department for Transport, the county will get up to £167.7 million to fix its potholes by the end of this Parliament.

It is part of a £1.6 billion pot for road maintenance announced earlier this week.

However, up to a third of each local authority’s grant will only be provided if it can demonstrate the money will go towards sorting the roads and won’t be siphoned off elsewhere.

Recent data from Asphalt Industry Alliance showed there was an £18.62 billion backlog of road repairs in England and Wales, which could take 12 years to clear.

A survey by the organisation found that one in six local roads had less than five years’ structural life remaining.

Alexander told the Sun: ‘I do think that by the end of this Parliament, drivers should be experiencing a better quality road network.’

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