EXTRA funding to repair and improve the county’s road network has been awarded to Cumbria County Council.

The local authority is to receive more than £3 million as its share of a £100 million fund of emergency payments announced today to help repair the nation’s winter damaged roads.

The county council has already submitted a £1.8 million bid to a separate £80 million Government funding pot to repair roads damaged by severe weather and flooding, following the country’s wettest winter on record.

CCC will now be making a second bid for further additional funding, following the Government’s announcement in the Budget yesterday that a new £200 million potholes challenge fund is being launched to enable councils to apply for further road repair money.

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Coun Keith Little, CCC’s Cabinet member for Highways and Transport, said: “We welcome this extra funding, which recognises the significant challenge the county council faces in maintaining one of the largest rural road networks in the country. This extra money will give us the opportunity to invest even more money in repairing our roads after a very wet and damaging winter.

“We will now be studying the detail of the latest funding scheme announced in the Budget yesterday so that we can put forward the strongest possible case for additional Government money to invest in Cumbria’s road network.

“Maintaining and improving our highways is a clear priority for the council, and much good work has already been done by our highways teams who are continuing to work around the county to repair road defects. We have invested some £30 million in our planned road repair programme in 2013/14 and this year we expect to have fixed over 40,000 reported road defects.”