TORFAEN AM, Lynne Neagle, has welcomed the idea of a taskforce looking at Wales’ unadopted roads after commenting on the “woeful” condition of some roads in Cwmbran.

Speaking during a member debate this month on the issue, Ms Neagle said she had dealt with a steady stream of complaints about pot holes in unadopted roads in her 19 years as an Assembly Member for Torfaen.

In some cases, she said, roads have been in a “genuinely woeful condition”.

A motion on unadopted roads was originally supported on January 23 and debated on February 14 which calls on Welsh Government to establish a taskforce including local authorities, the legal profession, developers and key stakeholders.

The aim is to develop improvements to the house buying and road adoption process.

“I made a site visit a few years ago to Brook Street in Pontrhydyrun in Cwmbran to find that the road was in such a bad state on a rainy day that a duck had actually taken up residence in one of the potholes,”Ms Neagle said.

“I hasten to add that this was not a water feature that anybody in the street was pleased to see.”

She added: “I welcome the idea of a taskforce. We all know that we are in very difficult times because of austerity with our public finances but I hope that bringing people together and can be an opportunity to look at innovative solutions and where local authorities can come together to block buy materials and to work together to do things.

“I really think we have to think outside of the box on this.

“Otherwise, it will be a problem that is with us in another 40 years and that duck will still be there.”

The motion also called for a Wales-wide programme to reduce the number of adopted roads in Wales.

It noted the number of roads in Wales which are unadopted and not maintained by the relevant local authority and that a number of developers have not built roads on new estates to acceptable standards.

The motion added that house buyers are faced with investing “significant” sums to bring roads up to the local authority’s adoptable standard.

In many cases, the motion adds, roads “remain unadopted and in a bad state of repair, for a number of years, sometimes in perpetuity”.