A Channel 5 current affairs show host was startled by a raging caller who shared her hatred for one of Britain’s most popular pet peeves. Tina, from Bath, was invited by presenter Alexis Conran, standing in for Jeremy Vine on his Channel 5 programme, to share what’s been “bugging” her as part of his Get It Off Your Chest segment. In response, she screamed: “Potholes!”
Tina said: “I’m fed up with them.
“And I’m fed up with them on the pavement because people keep falling down.”
Her outraged comments come as new data shows that pothole compensation claims have cost councils more than £300 million in the last 10 years with more than 2,000 people seriously hurt and 94 killed in crashes.
In response to Tina’s call, panellist, and broadcaster Nina Myskow replied: “London is horrendous.
“I actually fell just before Christmas, I was walking through the hospital car park which has a shortcut through.
“It was quite dark… I didn’t realise there was a massive pothole… I just went straight down. Fortunately, I was wearing a great big coat, I was a bit like Mr Blobby.
“I went down and I didn’t damage anything, but I mean it could’ve done my nose, my hands… everything.”
Tina isn’t alone in her anger at the poor quality of Britain’s road surfaces. Some people have even taken the problem into their own hands.
In Cornwall, highway chiefs are searching for the mystery pothole filler who poured concrete into a pothole “without consent”.
Many Express readers fell firmly on the side of the pothole filler.
One user commented about the mystery motorist: “Anyone who grasses this person up deserves to be put in the village stocks and pelted relentlessly with pothole debris”.
Another added: “If councils got off their behinds and did what they are supposed to do then people wouldn’t have to do it themselves.”
According to The Annual Local Authority Road Maintenance survey, more than £14bn would be needed to eliminate the gigantic backlog of road repairs.
