Potholes targeted by new MAG-backed petition

The Motorcycle Action Group has renewed its opposition to potholes, with a new “Resurface our Roads” campaign, in which it is supporting a petition. 

The fundamental aim of the Motorcycle Action Group’s (MAG) Resurface our Roads campaign is to improve, generally, the quality of the road surfaces in the UK, which MAG currently describes as “crumbling.”

In order to improve road surfaces, MAG opines that more funding must be funneled towards that end. As such, it is supporting a petition raised by Dean Murphy which is seeking to raise the issue of increasing funding for road repairs.

The petition states: “The Government takes billions a year from road users. We deserve better investment in road maintenance, not simply waiting for potholes to appear then filling them.

“Many roads need resurfacing to provide better, safer conditions for all road users. The Government should increase funding for this.

“Road surfaces in many areas are a disgrace and not becoming of a supposedly developed leading world economy.

“Potholes are an obvious danger to all road users but our roads need much more than the sticking plaster of pothole repair, much of which takes an age to be undertaken.

“Nor is it simply about safety; there is a total lack of civic pride. Improving roads could help improve wellbeing by reducing stress. Invest more of the billions of pounds of revenue taken from road users into road infrastructure.”

While potholes are a danger for all road users, the increased danger of riding a motorcycle compared to driving a car, for example, means that such damaged road surfaces present an even greater risk to those on two wheels. If a car driver drops a wheel into a pothole it might break the suspension or cause a puncture. If a motorcycle rider goes through a pothole it is possible that they could fall and hurt themselves, potentially seriously. 

This means that, of all road users, motorcyclists are particularly animated in their displeasure with potholes, their severity, and the frequency with which you come across them.

MAG’s Director of Campaigns & Political Engagement, Colin Brown, said: “Potholes are an emotive subject for riders. A simple request for stories of pothole related crashes on MAG’s social media attracted a response rate higher by an order of magnitude than other posts. Potholes have always been in the top five issues that get raised by our membership. 

“The recent announcement by Jeremy Hunt of an extra £200 million to tackle the issue is risible when taken in the context of the £14 billion backlog of repairs reported by the Asphalt Industry Alliance in their 2023 ALARM report.”

The petition is currently at 3,071 signatures, at the time of writing (23 May 2023), and is currently aiming for 10,000, at which point the UK government has to respond to it. The petition can be found and signed on the UK Government and Parliament petitions website.

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