Shropshire Councils spent more than £200,000 on emergency road salt supplies last year to combat the bad weather, new figures revealed today.

Telford & Wrekin Council ordered nearly 2,000 tonnes of salt less for this winter. Shropshire Council requested an extra 7,000 tonnes of salt for 2010-11, according to the figures released by The Taxpayers’ Alliance. The information does not take into account road grit.

Last year Shropshire Council was forced to fork out £147,000 for more road salt while Telford & Wrekin shelled out an extra £62,377.

Chris Daniel, policy analyst at the Taxpayers’ Alliance, said: “Many councils were clearly unprepared for the last icy spell, because they had ordered less salt than they did last year.

“It is unacceptable for councils to write off their failings by claiming that extreme winters in Britain are too rare an event for it to be worth preparing.

“This winter is the third in a row where severe weather has swept across the UK so councils and highways agencies have no excuses for not having everything in place.

“While some seem to have learned from last year and ordered extra supplies for the current winter period, others have not,” Chris added.

But Telford & Wrekin Council hit back at the suggestion the council was unprepared for the latest weather.

Councillor Adrian Lawrence, cabinet member with responsibility for the environment, said: “The council this year increased its salt stocks by 60 per cent to 2,700 tonnes, its highest ever levels.

“The Taxpayers’ Alliance information was gathered this autumn before much gritting began.

“Since then we have experienced some very hard conditions and the council has, since November, ordered at least as much salt again to supplement what it has used so far this winter.

“The TPA makes some ill-founded claims to gain a cheap headline by comparing eight months worth of salt orders, excluding the harshest winter months, with an entire years’ worth.

“It comes as little surprise then that, in the 12 months up to April 2010, when we experienced a very prolonged cold spell from January onwards, we had taken delivery of more salt than in the eight months that followed.”

The figures showed the total cost of purchasing emergency supplies of road salt in 2009-10 was £10.5 million, with North Yorkshire leading the way by spending £533,652.