DRIVERS who have left grass verges on residential streets looking like a First World War battlefield could face prosecution, a council has heard.

Darlington Borough Council’s leisure and environment boss Councillor Nick Wallis said it was being examined whether people who drive on verges could be prosecuted and while it was an “exceptionally complicated position” he wanted councillors to discuss the possibility.

Councillor Charles Johnson told a meeting of the authority complaints over rutted verges and damage to verges were rising, and rutted patches were a trip hazard.

Councillor Wallis replied the authority no longer had the funds to invest in verge hardening, leading to about “30 per cent of verges in Darlington being rutted or looking like something out of the Battle of the Somme”.

He said: “That’s down to individuals not respecting the environment, often in which they live. There’s peer pressure that should be brought to bear on those individuals.

“It will be very much down to residents on a street by street basis to work out what works best for them.”