Week seven of my campaign and I am still getting reports of pothole problems.

My top troublesome tarmac tweet of this week came from @Karen_Crean who burst a tyre on High Road, Loughton, after hitting a hole around a utility cover.

Karen will now have to shell out £80 on a new tyre but has reported the fault so anyone else unfortunate enough to hit it may be able to claim compensation.

Today I encountered an already inspected bitumen blemish around another utility cover in High Street, Epping.

The deep dent has been inspected and given a maximum time of 28 days for repair under Essex County Council guidelines so the countdown is on to see if they can hit their own target.

There are now 12 potholes outstanding in my campaign which have not been fixed within a month.

The council rightly prioritises the most dangerous and dastardly dents on the busiest roads but how long do those using minor roads have to suffer shoddy surface conditions?

The answer under council criteria could be indefinitely depending on their classification of the horror holes.

Some of the perilous potholes I have heroically highlighted could cause serious injury to an unsuspecting cyclist or accident prone pedestrian let alone motorists.

National guidelines in the highly helpful highway maintenance code of practice show any defects of 15mm depth on a footpath should be investigated and any defect of 20mm on a road.

Some carriageway craters I have reported are at least twice the depth recommended for inspection and have been there for over a month.