Gardiner says DRD is "the mouse that roared"

"levels of fines for not reinstating roads properly a joke" says MLA

Sam Gardiner MLA, the Ulster Unionist Assembly Member for Upper Bann, has described the penalties for contractors failing to reinstate roads properly as "derisory" and "a joke."

"I wrote to the Roads Minister asking him to outline the procedures and scale of fines or penalties imposed on utility operators who open our roads but fail to reinstate the road to an acceptable standard."

"In his answer he told me that the code of practice for inspections which dates to 2003 sets out the following process. First the utility operator is alerted to the defects in their work, then they agree the correct level of work with the department, then there is a further inspection to see if the work has been carried out satisfactorily and all the offending utility operator has to pay for are the inspection fees incurred which are just £60. If, over a period of time, more than 10% of the utility operator's reinstatements of roads they have dug up is found to be defective, they are at risk of a level three fine not exceeding £1,000."

"This level of fine is a joke. It bears no relationship to the scale of the problem and it would be considered as a risk well worth taking by most utility operators who regularly open our roads. It actually makes the Department of Regional Development look ridiculous. The DRD is literally the mouse that roared. Nobody operating on the scale of these utilities would pay any attention to the possibility of a £1,000 fine which just might be imposed. In 2008 the roads service promised the public accounts committee that it would prosecute where a utility operator repeatedly fails to finish its reinstatement work to an acceptable standard. What I am saying is with fines like this that promise is hollow."

"Last year in Upper Bann the roads were opened 3,311 times. In all Northern Ireland's roads have been opened 48,900 times in the past year - that is 134 times every day of the year. Across the province Phoenix Natural Gas alone opened our roads an amazing 5,076 times - that is 98 road openings each week of the year."