20 fines a month for companies digging up Swindon roads
Nearly 200 fines have been handed out in just nine months
Last updated 23rd Jun 2022
Companies digging up the roads around Swindon have already been fined nearly 200 times in less than a year.
But officials at Swindon Borough Council who issue the fixed penalty notices of £80 were reluctant to say which companies have received the fines under the councils Streetworks licensing scheme for fear of ruining good working relations with the companies.
Members of Swindon Borough Council’s communities and place overview and scrutiny committee were given an update on the workings of the councils’ licensing scheme for roadworks, which came into effect at the start of October last year.
Officer Philip Martlew said: “We are about nine months into the first year. We will be doing a full review of the first year of its operation in the late Autumn.”
Mr Martlew told the councillors that in those nine months 189 fixed penalty notices had been issued after inspections of roadworks – that works out at just over 20 a month.
Pressed by Councillor Jim Grant as to the identity of the companies who had been fines Mr Martlew was reluctant to give that information. He said: “We have a need to promote a healthy working relationship with the companies using the scheme.
“It might be that ‘name and shame’ by use would not lead to that co-operative and collaborative relationship, so we’d want to look at that before releasing that information.”
The £80 fines initially go to the Streetworks team to cover the costs or administering the scheme and inspecting work. So far more than £15,000 has been raised.
The plan when the scheme was brought in was to manage and co-ordinate the occurrence of roadworks in the borough to minimise disruption and prevent duplication – where two companies dig up the same stretch of road in a short time frame.
The report showed the extent of the demand for works: “In an average year the council receives 16,000 applications to work on the highway, with 47,000 days of combined occupation of the highway network.”
It added that most were of short duration and the high volume made consulting with residents on individual works impossible in most cases.
Mr Martlew added: “The works are needed, either for growth and development or for new technologies like fibre which are good things for the town and the residents.”