An “incensed” councillor has spoken out after discovering more than 60 street lights around the Wycombe area were not working.

East Wycombe Independent councillor Julia Wassell, said she personally went to count how many were out, and was furious to find there were 68 in total in the Bowerdean, Micklefield, Totteridge and Rye Mead areas.

She said: “Many of these are in residential roads. If they are not fixed, accidents could happen.”

Cllr Wassell said she noticed several lights around Wycombe were not working, and took to social media to find out whether other residents had experienced anything similar, getting a wave of responses from people who complained about the lack of street lighting in their areas.

She claimed some had been “out for months”, while others for a few weeks.

Transport for Bucks (TfB), which looks after the majority of street lights in the county, stressed they were carrying out regular repairs of lights which were reported as broken to them.

Cllr Wassell emailed the authority, saying she was pleased with the “quick response”.

She added: “I was incensed when I found out so many lights were out. They are now being fixed.

“The response from the authorities has been very good. The email I received said they should be fixed in 10 working days, which is the 16th. I am happy with the council’s quick response.

“If they haven’t been fixed by then, people should contact Transport for Bucks. I’ll be very annoyed if they haven’t fixed them by the 16th.”

A spokesman for TfB said those who reported broken street lights, would get an automated email reading: “We will check if the issue you have reported is known to us. If the enquiry has not been previously reported we will assess within 10 working days.

“The reported issue will either be monitored as part of the routine inspections programme or be added to our works programme to be repaired.

“We will continue to update you by email when your report reaches key stages. You may also track the progress of your report by using the Track It function.”

The spokesman said: “Transport for Buckinghamshire (TfB) own and maintain in excess of 28,000 street lights with approximately 8,000 being in High Wycombe.

“Lamps and control gear do fail as with all electrical components and require maintenance with approximately 7,000 repairs being carried out each year countywide.

“Providing the column number and road of each street light has been reported correctly the street lighting team will endeavour to attend for assessment within 28 days, as per the service level agreement.

“In some cases a simple repair is not possible due to potential underground cable faults, in this instance these faults are passed to the relevant electricity board for rectification.

“Should additional traffic management or non-standard equipment be required, these outages will be put in a programme of works and repaired as soon as possible.”