AN MP is calling for people to support his campaign to improve maintenance of roads in rural areas of his constituency.

Torridge and West Devon Conservative MP Geoffrey Cox is compiling a petition on the issue that will be presented to the House of Commons.

He told the Post: “I’ve currently got people out on the highways and byways trying to collect as many signatures for my rural roads petition as possible.

“We hope to get a minimum of 5,000 signatures before I take it on to the House of Commons. We are almost there with this target and only have a few hundred more signatures to collect.

“Once I have all the signatures I need, I will be taking the petition on and will seek an audience with the speaker of the Commons.

“The Minister will have to be present and I will then be able to produce the petition and voice my concerns to them of Torridge and the state of its roads.”

Mr Cox’s petition declares that Parliament and the Government are obliged to make sure those living in rural communities are not disadvantaged by poorly maintained roads and that more must be done to ensure their swift repair.

Rural roads are a vital access point for many secluded and usually isolated villages and communities. It has become an increasing problem in Devon that the state of roads is getting worse and action is not being taken to carry out suitable repairs until potholes and road surfaces have become almost unusable.

Mr Cox is working towards implementing better plans, alongside Government, with the launch of his public petition, after the issue has been brought up with him repeatedly by frustrated and angered constituents.

He said: “We have had success in the past at getting repairs to roads made, but only when I have made a fuss.

“This shouldn’t be the case and I hope to be able to persuade the Minister and the county council that a proper plan needs to be put in place to solve the problem of the poor state of Torridge’s rural roads.”

The county council says on its website that a pothole will only be considered for repair if it exceeds 40mm in depth and is greater than 300mm in any given horizontal direction.

Potholes that meet these specific criteria are then classed as a safety defect and will receive either a temporary or permanent repair — the type of repair a pothole receives depends on the category of the road.

However, a temporary repair or ‘surface dressing’ is only a quick fix and roads can only be treated in this way between April and September as the process needs to be completed in warm, dry conditions so the ‘dressing’ can become established.

The problem is that rural roads are still not classed as a high priority and many are being poorly maintained if at all.

Mr Cox said: “People living in rural communities are starting to be treated like second-class citizens. They seem to be classed as a subordinate priority because they do not live on a main arterial route, which seems to be the county council’s main focus for repairs.”

The county council’s website states that the ‘priority is to keep busier roads in a serviceable condition with the limited resources we have available.’

Mr Cox suggests that rural roads are being forgotten about because they are not the council’s main priority, something he hopes his petition will change.

He said: “I want to express the issues of isolation that are caused in rural communities by poorly maintained roads.

“As the poor state of the roads becomes increasingly worse so does the isolation of many living in rural areas. “

Mr Cox met county council leader John Hart to express his thoughts on what could be done to improve the maintenance of Devon’s rural roads. Before his meeting he told the Post: “One thing that I hope to get across is that the needs of villagers should be considered, for example if people from villages aren’t able to get out due to poor road quality, then how are the emergency services going to get in?”

If a road becomes closed due to road surfaces being unsuitable for vehicles it poses a threat to many residents of villages, some of which only have one route in and out. In this event, emergency services would not be able to respond to a call in an effective manner, potentially putting lives at risk.

Mr Cox hopes his petition will send strong signals to Government Ministers that action needs to be taken: “My hope is that the more signatures the petition gets, the more attention it will have to help bring into focus the desperate need for repair to Torridge’s rural roads. I would urge anyone who feels strongly about this to download the petition from my website and sign it to help us reach our 5,000 target.”

To download the petition visit: www.geoffreycox.co.uk/rural_roads

To report a pothole, visit the county council website: new.devon.gov.uk/roadsandtransport