HARD-PRESSED councils are facing difficult decisions over spending next year and the current bout of bad weather must be playing havoc with their financial calculations.

Durham County Council has already exhausted its budget for keeping the roads clear this winter. It expects to spend an extra £2m on salt supplies and shift payments for gritter crews before the worst is over.

As if this is not bad enough, when the snow and ice clear away the full extent of the damage done to our roads will be revealed.

Weeks of freezing weather followed by a short-lived thaw have turned even well-surfaced roads into pockmarked battlefields. The cost to local authorities for fixing these routes is another looming financial headache.

Councils will have to find yet more money when so much has already been spent on grit to keep our roads clear, but if the potholes are not filled the bill will grow and grow.

Based on current spending it will take an astonishing 13 years to clear the backlog of pothole repairs across England.

Local authorities will no doubt say this is because so little money has been released to help solve the problem.

And with such a meagre amount of cash to go round, roads that need major repairs are often patched up - only to fail again the following winter.

What this country really needs is a proper system of on-going maintenance that will prevent our roads degenerating into cart tracks over the winter. But with the transport budget under pressure this seems unlikely.

So hard-up motorists go on paying the price – in gouged wheels , punctured tyres and damaged bodywork.