Conservative election poster: Tories use picture of German road in 'road to recovery' election poster

The original photo was taken six years ago near the German town of Weimar

The Conservative Party's inaugural general election poster is being widely mocked for using a photograph of a German road to represent Britain's "road to a stronger economy".

Still reeling from criticism over the poster's disputed claim that the deficit has been halved, Chancellor George Osborne told Channel 4 News on Friday: "It's a British picture, a British road."

But the image actually derives from a 2008 photo taken by Alexander Burzik near his hometown of Weimar in central Germany.

The original picture, which can be found on the iStock photo library, run by Getty Images, has been photoshopped — the cracks removed and the colouring altered.

In an email to Elaine O'Neill, the photographer said: "I think 35 percent of the picture is taken from my picture, the sky and other elements from other pictures."

Since the image's origin was revealed, Conservative political opponents have been mocking the mistake on social media, including UKIP leader Nigel Farage who tweeted simply: "Oh dear..."

Former Labour MP Tony McNulty wrote: "Another nail in the coffin of political satire - road photo in Conservative poster is German - Weimar!!"

Some Conservatives have leapt to the poster's defence, with MEP Daniel Hannan tweeting: "So what if the photograph was taken in Germany? A reminder that our economy is set to overtake theirs in 25 years."

But political barbs aside, the gaffe is mainly just inspiring a bunch of Twitter jokes like journalist Chris Deerin's: "Because the Tories used a photo of a German road rather than a British one on their poster I'm voting Christian Democrat. Or something."

Although the Tory's poster is about as poor a start to a general election campaign as you can get, Labour's first poster isn't that much better — relying on a five year old meme of David Cameron.