North Yorkshire Councillors Urge Mayor To Reconsider Highway Funding Reallocation

North Yorkshire councillors have backed a call for Mayor David Skaith to reconsider a decision that reallocates millions of pounds of road repair funding to York.

North Yorkshire councillors have backed a call for the regional Mayor, David Skaith, to reconsider a decision on highway funding, which council leaders claim reallocates millions of pounds from North Yorkshire to York.

The dispute centres around a change in the highway maintenance allocation split between North Yorkshire Council and the City of York Council for the period between 2026 and 2030. The revised ratio stands at 90:10, representing a significant shift from the previous 92.7:7.3 split.

North Yorkshire Council leaders claim the move will cost the county £20 million in road repair funding over the four-year period, with £4 million diverted directly to York. Councillors argue that the authority will actually receive around £20 million less over the four years due to the changes than it would if the money came directly from the Department for Transport.

North Yorkshire Council has already initiated formal legal proceedings and is actively seeking a judicial review, arguing that the budgetary decision was made without the required unanimous agreement.

North Yorkshire Council Leader, Councillor Carl Les, said:

"We've sent a letter before action. We've had a response. I think that response is poor in my opinion. Fortunately, that's also the opinion of our legal council. So we've responded again, setting out our position.

Legal action is expensive, but so is the financial impact on North Yorkshire, if this decision stands.

I would like to avoid legal action. I'll make that absolutely clear. But I would like the mayor to agree to a face to face discussion about this."

The reallocation of funds comes at a time when North Yorkshire's roads have suffered significant deterioration due to severe weather exposure, altitude, and heavy traffic. According to the council, over 2,200 potholes have been fixed in the last eighteen months.

Councillor Carl Les added:

"I am disappointed that we're at this point. I'm very disappointed in fact. The biggest disappointment of course is the impact.

Following one of the worst winters we've had for a long time for persistent rain, which has got into our road infrastructure where we need every penny of maintenance money. We have found ourselves in a situation where we have lost income coming in, income that the Prime Minister was saying, "Here you are, all local authorities there's more money for you for road maintenance, for maintenance."

But I'm also disappointed at the process. Checks and balances were put into the combined authority for when it was set up. It largely functions on consensus. At this point, there was no consensus."

Councillor Monika Slater says she's not surprised by the decision to reallocate the funding from North Yorkshire to York:

"What's in question is why the calculation made by the Department for Transport has not been applied in this case.

But I'm not surprised, and I'm not surprised because we didn't get a good deal when we came to creating the combined authority in the first place. York got a much better slice of the pie. I think he's just carrying on the same way. I think that when we went into this and when we looked at whether we should have a mayor, whether we should have a combined authority, the assumption was that the ruling party here would also rule that mentality and rule that combined authority, and it just hasn't come to pass. And I'm sorry, but I'm not surprised."

Councillor Stuart Parsons backed the call for the Mayor to revisit the decision warning that North Yorkshire could be left with failing roads.

"If we're not careful, what we're going to get is the York City area with Grade A roads, and everything feeding into it from North Yorkshire with grade D or grade E roads.

So, the mayor needs to also think about the economy of York because if we can't travel there safely because of all the potholes he's left for us, then he's not going to get the money we would normally spend within his community.

But go for him, and go for the money because we need it."

The decision to reallocate the funding was taken by the Labour Mayor with support from the two York Labour councillors on the combined authority and was opposed by the two Conservative councillors from North Yorkshire.

Since before the creation of the combined authority concerns have been voiced about the balance of power within the authority, the City of York and North Yorkshire both have two seats on the authority and there fore both have two votes despite North Yorkshire having a much larger population.

Councillor David Staveley feels the decision to reallocate the funding has been influenced by politics..

"Clearly there is an element of politics going on here. Ironically, I think it's more to do with the psycho drama within one party because we've got central government which to their credit have done a really good thing with the money that they've given us to try and address this issue and then a local representative of their party, naively seeing it as an opportunity to maybe play to his base. I don't know. Maybe he's just been badly advised.

We are asking him to come to the table. Let us try and inform him on maybe the flaws in his plan. But the main thing is he's got to make the move. And I really think it will be to his benefit, not just ours, to do so because ultimately he's the Mayor of York and North Yorkshire, not the mayor of York."

Councillor Caroline Goodrick underlined the political balance issue with some numbers, adding:

"The mayor has hijacked our budgets and it will impact every councillor in this room because we're going to have a lot less money to deal with 6 ,500 miles of road and York have 900. So let's be quite clear. The mayor needs to come to the table.

He needs to remember the 615,000 residents he represents in North Yorkshire and not be so York-centric."

Mayor David Skaith has defended the budget, stating that the council will receive a record-breaking £268 million over the next four years to fix roads. He has described the council's legal action as a political stunt which could waste taxpayer money.

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