Brent Council will continue with a new rapid repair programme as it tries to deal with potholes on the borough’s roads.

It confirmed in a report this week that, following a successful trial period, it will extend the method for 2018/19.

The ‘injection patching’ system can repair a pothole in just two minutes. It would take 10-15 minutes to patch up the damage via a conventional method.

John Westell, highways contract and delivery manager at Brent Council, said 2,700 potholes were repaired over an eight-week period in the summer at an average of 68 per day.

Cllr Roxanne Mashari, sitting on the resources and public realm scrutiny committee, questioned the process of reviewing damage and the lack of physical assessments.

Mr Westell explained that they are carried out from a desk, with assessors looking at photographs as opposed to spending time at the roads.

“You can audit 100 per cent from the desk, which we think is better than looking at a smaller sample in person,” he said.

“We have this technology, which covers most defects clearly and I think this is the best solution.

“We don’t have the resources to do site visits for 100 per cent, we have a two people in the reactive team.”

Reviewing the overall pothole strategy, he added that the poor weather over winter and spring had made things particularly difficult.

“It was not an ideal time to repair a pothole. You can either leave it or fill it up – but we always look to fill it up,” he said.