A Cononley man is angry that North Yorkshire County Council has refused to pay for repairs to his vehicle following damage caused by a pothole.

The vehicle driven by Eddie Padgett, of Croft House, sustained £261 in damage to an alloy wheel when he drove over a pothole in Carleton Road, Skipton, on July 31.

Since then, Mr Padgett has been wrangling with the county council’s insurance company Cunningham Lindsey, which has refused to pay his claim.

After the incident, Mr Padgett contacted North Yorkshire’s highways depot, at Snaygill, in Skipton.

He supplied it with photographic evidence of the pothole and forwarded his claim for damage to his vehicle. Highways filled in the hole two days later and Mr Padgett has since had two letters from the insurer disputing the repair claim.

One letter stated: “We do not doubt that there was a defect at the time of the incident and even though it had not reached the required 40mm for action to be taken, it was still repaired to avoid any further incidents. The council cannot be blamed for potholes developing.”

A spokesman for North Yorkshire County Council said: “Under the terms of the Highways Act, we are obliged to carry out routine safety inspections of all our roads to ensure that they are in a safe condition and where they are not in a safe condition we are required to take appropriate action.

“An inspection of this particular road was carried out on July 18 and it was found to be in safe condition.The incident in question was reported to us on July 31. This was the first notification we received of this defect. The fact that we had carried out our obligations under the terms of the Act means that we are not legally liable for any damage caused.”

“They’ve botched that road repair several times,” said Mr Padgett. “They’ve put asphalt on it during the winter and it had no time to set. Frost and water could still penetrate it, so it was virtually cosmetic.”

He added: “The council appears to be under-resourced as our roads and services are worse than 20 years ago but our council tax escalates and we are asked to provide more for winter damage to roads.”

He was also upset that he was asked to employ a solicitor if he wanted to take the claim any further.

“I’m not going to incur any more expense because I’ve already had to pay for the repairs,” said Mr Padgett, who said the process was already costing the taxpayer more than the claim itself.

However, a county council spokesman said the claim was handled by the insurer at no expense to the taxpayer.