Council highways team’s 1000sof call-outs

West Sussex County Council’s highways team has been called out to almost 8,000 emergency issues in the past two years.

Seven of them – flooding at Shripney, Pagham and Bognor Regis, embankment failures at Duncton, Pulborough and Wiston Bends, and the Angel Inn fire at Midhurst – were classed as major highway incidents.

The figures were shared during a scrutiny committee meeting where members were asked to consider whether the council’s approach to major incidents was still appropriate given that extreme weather was forecast to increase in the coming years. The committee made a number of suggestions including the need for a steering group to be set up whenever a major incident took place. Such a group would include councillors local to the incident.

Another suggestion was that a contingencybudgetshouldbecreatedspecificallytohelppayforthe fallout from major incidents. The idea was put forward by Nigel Jupp(con,southwater&nuthurst), who estimated that the seven major incidents had put a £2m dent in the highways budget. Mr Jupp alsospokeabouttheembankment failure in December 2022 which caused a landslide and blocked the A29 at Pulborough. The fallout from that incident is still being dealt with and is being looked into by the council’s legal team. The meeting was told that 75,000 inquiries had been made to the highways team in the past year – that number was usually around 50,000to55,000.mrsdennissaid theteamshadbeen‘overwhelmed’ and morale had been low.

The situation was not helped bytheabusewhichhasbeenfaced by staff while trying to do their work on the county’s roads. Officers said the aim was to spend part of the 2024/25 budget on staff and resources.