Welwyn Hatfield MP Grant Shapps has called on County Hall to improve a badly potholed road that residents say has not been resurfaced for at least 40 years.

Mr Shapps condemned the poor state of Birch Grove after receiving several complaints about it, and described it as “the forgotten road of Welwyn”.

He said: “I wanted to see for myself how poorly maintained this road was. With the number of cracks and potholes I saw, on top of the fact that I have been told that it has not been resurfaced for at least 40 years, the county council need to address this to ensure that all residents can drive and use this road safely.”

Kevin Carroll, divisional manager of Hertfordshire County Council contractor Ringway, said: “A member of our local area team has inspected this road and there are no defects deeper than our 50- millimetre intervention level, so no urgent action will be taken at the current time. However, the road is being considered for our jet patching programme that will take place over the summer period.

“Jet patching is quite often used in this type of situation where the surface layer is coming away from the layers below.”