Mushrooms growing on damp wall of Sheffield council flat – “it’s horrible”

Gillian, who lives on the ground floor in a small block of flats in the High Street area of Ecclesfield, said: “It’s horrible.”

Her situation has been highlighted by ward councillor Rob Reiss, who posted a video of rain coming into the living room during last week’s Storm Babet on Twitter/X and pictured mushrooms growing on her wall.

Watch video: https://twitter.com/i/status/1715706463069356046

He invited director of housing Janet Sharpe and colleagues to the flats earlier this week to see the problems for themselves and discuss why repairs are taking so long. Coun Reiss said that, as a result of the visit, more work is being done on the flats than in the previous three months.

Gillian said the problems began in July when water pouring from the balcony above when it rained started coming into her living room, soaking everything. Her family has had to help her pack many of her belongings away and roll up the carpet to try and protect them.

She now struggles to move around the one-bedroom flat. Her TV is packed away to protect it so she watches a portable set in the bedroom or listens to the radio.

She contacted the council repairs service and said that has been a frustrating experience, with staff either not turning up or not having the appropriate skills to deal with the problem.

Gillian said: “It’s horrible. My living room has got smaller and smaller. My nephew keeps coming in and moving furniture.

“The water is flowing in. I’ve decamped to the bedroom.”

She added: “It’s not a home, it’s just a place that’s damp and smelly and my things are all over, I can’t find anything.

“It’s a bit of a nightmare. I’m disabled anyway. It’s doing my mental health no good.”

She said the problem has carried on for around four months, every time it rains. “It comes in the living room. We think it’s bouncing off the upstairs balcony and right through at the top of my window.”

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Gillian said that a council worker used a damp probe to show her the wall is completely soaked all the way through. Her nephew removed the mushrooms growing on the wall.

“I’ve had enough,” said Gillian. “I’ve kept giving them a chance. They sent joiners, saying ‘what can we do? We don’t know what we are here for’, which is stupid.

“They send the wrong people or they don’t turn up.”

Gillian said one team told her they needed to look on the roof but no scaffolding was available from the council’s sole supplier.

“They sent a child with a screwdriver. He put a shield on my window, saying, ‘There you go, it’ll be fine now’. Later on that afternoon it rained and it all came through.”

Gillian said that she got the impression that housing officials were shocked at what Coun Reiss showed and told them.

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Coun Reiss said that during the storms last week the water was 1cm deep on the floor. He said the council loaned Gillian a dehumidifier then asked for it back and she refused until the problem is fixed.

He said the flats were built in the 1950s and 60s quickly to rehouse people living in slums and they have now outlived their lifespan of 30 to 40 years.

Coun Reiss said he has been told that the building needs a new roof. He said that council departments need to talk to each other properly to decide quickly what needs to happen to resolve the problems and let tenants know.

“This lady hasn’t got great health. She has heart conditions and is living in a damp home,” he said. “Everyone knows what black mould can do.”

Coun Reiss said that there are many homes built during those years in other parts of his East Ecclesfield ward, such as the semi-detached houses in the Wheata Road area of Parson Cross, and flats around Colley Drive.

He has been contacted by other tenants following Storm Babet, worried about the state of their homes, many of which have damp and mould.

Coun Reiss said that years of government cuts to housing budgets have exacerbated problems. Councils now have to apply for separate pots of funding for different issues rather than getting consistent budgets to work with.

Asked what LibDems would do in power, he said: “It wouldn’t be an easy fix. I do shy from trying to put the knife in, every council is facing this. I have friends who are councillors in Stockport and Hull who are facing the same thing and how we are going to be investing in new council property.

“We need to move people into accommodation with better conditions and more insulation and better construction and they are still going to be in these places.”

Coun Douglas Johnson, chair of the housing policy committee, said: “We have been repairing this block for some time, but with the weather conditions, the immediate repairs were brought forward. This is to address cracked external walls, blocked gutters and drainage which we know have caused significant issues for tenants.

“Over the next two weeks, we are carrying out further concrete repairs to the external structure to ensure future leaks are avoided. Already planned for is a new roof, roofline works and pipework, which will be installed on this particular building next year, along with further external improvements to provide a long-term solution.

“The council will be fully supporting tenants affected by water damage over the next few weeks, including rectifying any internal damage caused and to mitigate flooding risk in the future.”