Students living in flats in the University of Hertfordshire's halls of residence have not had heating or hot water for more than a week.

The situation grew worse as Storm Arwen saw gale-force winds and frosty temperatures sweep across Welwyn Hatfield over the weekend.

One student, who lives in the Bellingham Court housing block at the University's Hatfield campus, hasn't had heating for 10 days since a leak caused heating outages on Sunday, November 21. The outages have mostly hit Bellingham and Spalding Court.

Hertfordshire University explained that their College Lane campus accommodation experienced short-term outages on Sunday, "the majority of which were fixed by Monday evening".

"In accommodation blocks where the issue continued, we provided students with heaters and alternative shower facilities, and students were offered alternative accommodation on a case-by-case basis," the spokesperson said.

A student living in Bellingham, who has asked not to be named, said that some flats still do not have hot water or any heating and that the University has now offered students the opportunity to take showers in other buildings where there is hot water.

But, the student added that they were finding it difficult to access heaters.

"We were offered to collect electric heaters at The Oval [gym] which I have tried twice but they did not have any left. So I guess they expected us to go over and over to The Oval and hopefully get one at some point," they said.

It wasn't until last night that space heaters were distributed to the remaining flats that are without working heating.

A spokesperson from the University of Hertfordshire said: "We are aware of ongoing maintenance issues in a small number of flats and apologise for the discomfort this has caused for students.

"University staff are working hard to resolve the remaining faults, and temporary generators are in place to restore heating and hot water to this accommodation as quickly as possible.

"Heaters and alternative shower facilities are available for all students who need it, and we ask any students who need further assistance to speak to their accommodation team."