I detail below an update to County Councillors: (below this is the weather,refuse and wintermaintenance update for today)

We are now advising the public that due to current under supply and future uncertainty of supply of salt, it is necessary to prioritise gritting to all A and B category roads throughout the county. This covers the vast majority of bus routes. Every effort will also be made to maintain main thoroughfares where there are significant gradients.

The Council will continue to plough all priority routes but only A and B category roads will be treated with salt from later tonight. We will also continue to keep the situation under review and as soon as more salt becomes available we will reprioritise.

It is important that everyone understands we are managing very difficult ongoing winter conditions with restricted supplies. So far we have spread more than 30,000 tonnes and have spent in excess of £3 million maintaining the highway network and priority footpaths. We also have utilized our streetscene resources with up to 200 of our staff clearing footpaths and town centres each day since the middle of December. Since the cold weather began, the Council has received significantly less salt than ordered.

The Council continues to do everything it can to maintain the highway network and to keep footpaths clear although we are reliant on having sufficient supplies of salt to enable us to do so.

Please be aware that salt is very good at preventing ice formation just below 0 degree (freezing point) however this effectiveness reduces quite considerably as temperatures decrease below -5 degrees.

At present overnight temperatures are reaching -8 degrees and are not rising above freezing point during the day. To be effective the salt also needs reasonable traffic levels to grind it into any lying snow. This explains why even well gritted roads are taking time to clear.

The cold spell has affected the whole country over a prolonged period and as a result, there are concerns about salt stocks nationally. Local authorities rely on salt stock being topped up by fresh deliveries over the winter period and at present accessing additional supplies is difficult because of the high demand nationally.

In County Durham we made sure that all of our salt barns were filled at the start of the winter. Even so the continued use of salt in keeping our roads open has meant that we have a difficult situation to manage. We must be prudent in our salt use in order to conserve stocks. Hence routine gritting is being restricted to the A and B roads.