FEWER than 20 miles of roads in York were maintained in the year to the end of March 2022, new figures show.

Department for Transport data shows just 12.7 miles of roads in York were fully resurfaced in the same period – while there were none five years before.

But no roads were surface dressed, where they are sprayed with a tar-like substance, before stone chippings are spread over the top and rolled in.

It can extend a road's lifetime by 10 years.

In 2017-18, 4.2 miles of roads were resurfaced or dressed in the area.

In the Spring Budget in March, the Government announced an extra £200 million would be invested in repairing England's potholes in 2023-24.

Of this, £504,000 was earmarked for York.

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It comes as the RAC has accused the Government of allowing road maintenance levels in England to decline, with fewer miles of road across the country surfaced or dressed than in any of the five years before.

Across England, just 1,123 miles of roads were resurfaced in 2021-22.

This is a 29 per cent fall on the 1,588 miles in 2017-18.

Similarly, surface dressing has fallen by 34 per cent over the same period.

But the RAC has urged the Government to increase investment in road protection, arguing potholes are a problem because of the worsening state of the roads.

RAC head of policy Simon Williams said: “These figures paint an incredibly stark picture of road maintenance in England and confirm our worst fears about the overall decline in the state of the country’s roads.

“While the Government has made more money available to authorities to fill potholes, it’s the general reduction in road improvement work that’s causing potholes to appear in the first place.

“It’s abundantly clear that councils in so many areas are barely scratching the surface when it comes to getting their roads up to a reasonable standard, and indeed the fact that such a large proportion haven’t done any surface dressing or resurfacing at all over a 12-month period really does say it all.

“We encourage local authorities to take a more preventative approach to road maintenance as this will make their squeezed budgets go further and improve England’s roads for the future.

“We also continue to call on the government to increase the roads funding settlements for councils, not least because England’s major roads receive seven times what local roads are given, despite the fact there are seven times more miles of minor roads.”

Councillor Pete Kilbane, Executive Member for Economy and Transport at City of York Council, said:

“This financial year the government gave us £3.3 million for road maintenance, which is nowhere near the amount needed, so we more than doubled it to £8.5 million by adding over £5 million from the council budget.

“In spite of the challenges we face through increased costs and labour shortages, the City of York Council is on track to deliver 100% of its £8.5 million highways budget for this year.

"This includes reactive repairs such as potholes as well as more proactive maintenance such as the large patch resurfacing, slurry sealing, surface dressing and footway repairs.

"I pay tribute to the hard work of all those involved delivering these schemes on time and to budget.

"They are providing an essential service for the people of our city.

"We await confirmation from the government of further funding and hope it is forthcoming sooner rather than later as the City of York Council has a proven track record of delivering these type of projects.”

The Department for Transport said: “It’s for local authorities to maintain their highways, and to help them do that we’re investing more than £5 billion from 2020 to 2025, with an extra £200 million announced at the Budget in March, to resurface roads up and down the country.

“We’ve also brought in new rules to clamp down on utility companies leaving potholes behind after carrying out street works.”