Seriously ill Birmingham pensioners left with no heating

Dec 5 2010 by Adam Aspinall, Sunday Mercury

TWO pensioners recovering from serious illness have been left without heating in sub-zero temperatures after council contractors failed to fix their broken boilers.

Grannies Patricia Stewart and Lilian Whittall, both 74, were both released from hospital in the last week to discover their heating had failed as Arctic conditions swept the country.

Mrs Stewart, from Kitts Green in Birmingham, had been suffering from pneumonia while Mrs Whittall, from Castle Bromwich, is recovering from quadruple heart bypass surgery.

After discovering their heating had failed, the OAPS contacted Birmingham City Council who sent in its heating contractors, Mears, on Tuesday.

Yet in both cases engineers claimed the problems could not be fixed immediately as they would need to send away for spare parts.

But a chilly Mrs Stewart said: “It’s like an icebox in here and I fear I could easily die if I’m not careful. It’s a disgrace.

‘‘I am bed-bound and need round the clock care. I was a home help carer for Birmingham City Council for over 20 years and even then I never saw a case worse than mine.”

Mrs Whittall has had to be taken in by her daughter, Sharon Brookes, because of the heating failure at her property.

She said: “I was lucky, I had my daughter. But many other pensioners don’t have children and if they are left in a house with no heating someone is going to die.

‘‘I have been treated horrendously and I am too ill to put up with this nonsense.”

Two weeks ago we revealed how another elderly Birmingham couple, Michael and Brenda Freeman, face a freezing Christmas – because a Government heating scheme for OAPs does not come in to force until March.

Meanwhile, the death toll from the frozen conditions which have gripped the nation has risen to seven in recent days.

Fatalities include two Cumbrian pensioners who died after falling in their gardens, where they spent hours lying in sub-zero temperatures.