Sir, I am writing concerning your item about the potholes in our roads (Gazette, May 14, Going to pot!') and just had to let you know what happened to me.

I am a resident of Mealbank and at the end of our road the road surface is just disintegrating. There is also a trench right across the road on a blind corner that you cannot avoid. My car was beginning to suffer so I telephoned the Highways Agency, which in turn informed the council.

Lo and behold they came and filled in two potholes that I hadn't complained about and ignored the rest. I then made another phone call and was told that they would look into it.

The council then phoned me to let me know that they were aware of the problem and that work would not start until after April when they got some money.

I would just like to know where exactly my council tax goes to as the same week that the council told me they had no money our £1,500 tax bill arrived.

I am absolutely disgusted with it all.

Samantha Scarr Mealbank, near Kendal Relieve congestion Sir, The Government is now considering transport spending priorities ahead of its July Comprehensive Spending Review and finalising its vision for the next decade in the review of the Ten Year Transport Plan.

The UK's road network has suffered from years of under-investment and as such it is vital that planned improvements are delivered as soon as possible. We are the fourth largest economy in the world and yet seem unable to afford to build ourselves a few extra feet of road to ease acute congestion, which wastes time and money all of us end up paying for.

A coalition has been formed by the AA Motoring Trust, British Chambers of Commerce, Confederation of British Industry, Freight Transport Association, RAC Foundation and the Road Haulage Association to achieve more roads spending.

Of course firstly we must ensure that we have better management of our roads network in order to get the most out of it. However, better management can never provide a substitute for building extra capacity, particularly on industry's key trade routes: the M1, M4, M6, M25 and M60/62. Now is the time to commit funds to widen these key stretches of road.

The 2004 Comprehensive Spending Review must allocate £4.2 billion over the next three years to deliver the long overdue improvements to these roads that are in the Government's current Targeted Programme of Improvements (TPI). A further £8.2 billion of widening on these routes will be needed by 2010 and this should be at the heart of the new Ten Year Transport Plan.

With £38 billion collected in tax from road users each year, the investment proposed over the next ten years for the strategic road network could be financed from the proceeds of just six months of road taxation.

An extra lane just 12 feet wide will relieve the congestion on our motorways and save billions of pounds and billions of wasted man hours.

Malcolm Bingham Regional Policy Manager Freight Transport Association