Councillor claims lives are at risk due to motorway potholes

Tuesday, 24 February 2026 10:28

By Paul Faulkner

Lives are being endangered by potholes on a Lancashire motorway, a senior councillor has claimed.

Azhar Ali says the M65 between Burnley and Colne is “riddled” with defects, which drivers are having to swerve around at high speed.

The Progressive Lancashire opposition group leader on Lancashire County Council has criticised the authority for the condition of the route.

The vast majority of the motorway network is the responsibility of National Highways – but the six-mile stretch of the M65 between junctions 10 and 14 comes under the county council’s control for historical reasons.

County Cllr Ali told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “People are swerving – and if someone hits [a pothole] at 70mph, or even less, it’s going to blow [their] tyres.

“It’s a death waiting to happen,” he warned.

A spokesperson for Lancashire County Council said in response to the criticism that the authority prioritised the most urgent repairs to the almost 4,400 miles of highway for which it is responsible.

“Our roads carry over 4.6m journeys a day – and we fix around 3,400 potholes each month.

“Potholes are caused by wet and cold weather – and the freezing conditions early this year mean that our roads have suffered a lot of damage recently. We triage all requests and respond to these in order of priority.

“Our ‘managed service model’ delivers bigger, longer-lasting repairs, tripling the average fix size – and a single provider [has] replaced multiple contractors, freeing council teams to focus on urgent work and resurfacing.”

The Reform UK-run county council maintains almost all non-motorway routes in Lancashire. The authority announced late last year that there had been a 42 percent drop in the number of defects on its roads and pavements in the space of a year – with the total falling by more than 25,000 in the 12 months to September 2025 to then stand at 35,514.