EVERYONE has their own view on which street in their town is the worst for potholes.

On any given day, it’s easy to find complaints and grievances from people on Merseyside about the latest bump or crack in their road that needs fixing.

Merseyside councils, like all across the UK, are soon to get millions of pounds’ worth more funding to repair and fill the areas’ potholes – but many have argued that’s still not enough.

But how bad – or big – does a crack or bump in the road have to get, to be considered a pothole? And do holes that are on so-called bigger roads like motorways or A-roads, get preferential treatment?

Here are the answers to six questions about issue that seems to annoy people more than most.

1. How big does a pothole have to be before the council will fill it?

According to Wirral council, due to limited resources, a pothole is not considered for repair before it has a depth of 40mm or more, with a sharp edge and more than 30cm wide.

2. Do well-used roads get priority over backstreets?

Yes, repairs are prioritised based on the perceived level of risk to road users and pedestrians, and the location and use of the road as set out in the council’s highway policy.

Based on this, roads are split into five categories. For example, a ‘category one’ road is a strategic route between two primary destinations, such as the A41 in Wirral. A ‘category five’ road is a local access road serving a small number of homes.

3. How do I report a pothole?

Generally on the council website, in Wirral at wirral.gov.uk/roads – regardless of how big they are.

This allows the council to then add each pothole to their maintenance schedule and monitor how many they have to repair moving forward.

4. What happens after I report a pothole?

An inspector will visit the site and assess whether a pothole requires urgent repair or not. If it does, the repair team will carry out the work as quickly as possible and is practical, to keep the number of potholes to a minimum.

5. What’s the schedule for filling in potholes?

In terms of Wirral, the service that repairs potholes has recently moved back under council control and they are working through a backlog, but a new schedule will be made available “soon”.

6. How much money have our councils been given for potholes?

Out of the total £420m for the entire UK, £1.4m of that will go to Wirral, with Liverpool handed £1.868m. Around £1m will go to St Helens.

Figures for Knowsley and Sefton were not available.