Fears have been raised that vital salt supplies could be diverted away from the county as the Government takes control of grit deliveries.

Gloucestershire County Council has decided to revise its gritting schedule and salt only major routes to conserve its stock in the wake of the news.

Councils across Britain have been told today that the Government will take control of all national salt supplies, managing all future deliveries through a national ‘salt cell’.

The aim is to distribute salt that is available on a priority basis. This follows concerns that supplies are running low across the country.

With other councils’ salt supplies at crisis levels the county council has expressed concern that grit destined for Gloucestershire may be diverted to other councils.

A spokesman for the authority said: "With no let up in the cold conditions forecast for the next eight to 10 days, the council is reviewing its operations on a daily basis and taking action to ensure its salt supplies will last throughout this period."

Up until now the council has been gritting the entire primary and secondary road network.

However over the weekend this will be revised and only A roads and some B roads – that carry 75 per cent of the county’s traffic – will continue to be salted as required. Secondary routes will not be gritted to preserve stocks. This means from Saturday morning motorists are being warned that roads that were previously gritted may now be untreated.

The full list of treated roads is available on the council website.

The council said today that they estimate this level of gritting is likely to continue into next week, but the situation will be continually monitored.

Several others councils, such as Hampshire, have made similar decisions.

Before the winter, the council increased its salt stocks by 53 per cent to 7,500 tonnes. In the last two weeks alone the authority has used over 6,000 tonnes of salt - compared to 8,000 to 10,000 during the entirety of a normal winter.

Cllr Stan Waddington, cabinet member for environment, said: "The Government can give us no guarantees about when Gloucestershire will get its next salt delivery.

"There are lots of councils who are much worse off than Gloucestershire and they are likely to get priority. We have to make sure we have enough to last until the weather changes and we can't guarantee deliveries from now on. As more supplies come in, we can increase the amount of roads we grit. The advice remains the same to motorists - take extreme care and make essential journeys only."