Finally, a little bit of good news from the Chancellor's Budget.

For the past ten years, we've sat and watched as whichever government of the day took more and more away from the spending budgets of local authorities.

It would be hard to argue that austerity has not had a huge and detrimental effect on the vibrancy of our communities.

Tourist towns such as Kendal and the surrounding areas rely massively on street cleaners, roads maintenance and grass trimmers to keep their picturesque communities looking splendid and to attract tourist dollars (or euros or yen!).

Every council in the UK, faced with a choice between slashing life saving and vital services such as adult social care, and cutting the more aesthetic council services, has chosen the latter.

As a result, many residents complain that rubbish is left in the streets, bins are collected less frequently, and yes, the potholes have been left open.

As reported on page 17 of today's The Westmorland Gazette, some motorists have been left with heavy repair bills because councils simply cannot afford the same maintenance schedules they might have had a decade ago.

In the case of Peter Whitehead, of Cowgill, near Dent, it means he has been left off the road as Cumbria County Council has so far failed to pay the cost of repairing his car after hitting a pothole.

The 72-year-old says he cannot afford to put his hand in his pocket and pay the £1,000 repair bill for his BMW 6 Series’ shattered wheel because it amounts to two months’ pension.

Cumbria County Council did interim repairs to the pothole on Monday, March 2 and said a permanent patch would follow in due course, but it seems the incident was avoidable, were the council to have more funding.

Which is why the news that Chancellor Rishi Sunak will pour £2.5bn into the UK's potholes should be welcomed.

The money will be used to fix 50 million potholes that currently blight the road network, over the next five years.

In such a rural region such as this, the roads are quite often the only form of transport available, and an influx of cash could make a real difference to people who live in more isolated communities.