Since 2020 more than 40,000 roadworks have been required to deal with water leaks

12 Nov 2023
Alex Cole-Hamilton MSP

Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Alex Cole-Hamilton has today warned that water infrastructure failures have caused misery for road users as they suffer from roadworks due to leaks.

His warning comes as figures obtained by Scottish Liberal Democrats show that since 2020, 40,932 works have been carried out by Scottish Water that include excavation of roads to repair leaks.

An average of 30 roadworks per day have been needed to deal with water leaks between January 2020 and August 2023.

Mr Cole-Hamilton said:

“Scotland’s government’s owned water company has caused misery for road users right across the country.  

“We knew they were pumping out sewage into our waterways, now it emerges that the poor state of the network is causing traffic jams and getting in the way of buses and bikes too.

“While Scottish Water executives pocket bumper bonuses, people are suffering longer journey times because our infrastructure is in a state.

“The SNP are refusing to get tough. Nationalist ministers have become little more than spin doctors for the failing government-owned water company and its outdated standards.”

ENDS

Notes to editors:

In response to a request for information from Scottish Liberal Democrats, Scottish Water said:

Scottish Water holds information relating to all notifiable works carried out on carriageways, footways, cycleways, footpaths and verges to Scottish Water assets.  

A search has been carried out within our two relevant Scottish Water Systems, Scottish Road Works Register (SRWR) and the Reinstatements Database (RA) in relation to this question, and while we do not have the exact number of water leaks damaging the road surface for each year since 2020, based on the description of works in the SRWR we estimate the number of works carried out by Scottish Water that include excavation of roads to repair leaks on our networks and maintain supplies to customers. The figures below show the number of notices that appear to be repairs to leaks/ bursts on the water network per calendar year.  

Calendar Year:  Estimated Notices

2020:  9927

2021:  11812

2022:  10561

2023 (01 Jan- 31 Aug):  8632

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