Seven per cent of repair works on the worst urban local roads in Essex will be carried out in the Braintree district.

Essex County Council intends to target 700 roads in its ambitious maintenance programme, which involves spending an extra £17.5m to fix potholes and other road defects.

Fifty roads across Braintree, Witham and Halstead will be targeted.

Rodney Bass, cabinet member for highways and transportation, said: “These roads are in urgent need of repair and we are making the manpower available to get the job done - recently doubling the number of maintenance crews to 36 to bring the county’s roads up to standard.”

For the full story and the list of roads to be repaired, see this week's Braintree and Witham Times - out on Thursday.