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The Guardian
12-06-2025
- General
- The Guardian
‘We've been left in this mess': residents of condemned Merseyside blocks face eviction
Residents of two Merseyside tower blocks who have been ordered to leave after the buildings where they live were deemed unsafe say they feel 'stuck' and 'left behind'. Hundreds of people living in Beech Rise and Willow Rise, which stand beside each other in Kirkby, were issued a prohibition notice by Merseyside fire and rescue service in May. It is the latest revelation of the poor conditions of many privately rented dwellings and tenants' apparent lack of rights. Residents in Beech Rise and Willow Rise have been allowed to stay temporarily due to a 24-hour 'waking watch' of trained personnel carrying out inspections on the properties. The watch is expected to end any day, however, meaning that residents do not know how much time they have left in their homes. Once the watch is over, returning to their homes will be illegal. Aside from the odd sign of life the towers already look abandoned, with large puddles of water coming from behind locked doors, pipes hanging through holes in the ceiling and rubbish piling up in the hallways. Neither building has had a working lift for the past year, and residents had complained that the combination of constant leaks and bad wiring presented a constant fire risk. As a result, some flats had their supplies cut off, leaving many without power or water for months. Arunee Leerasiri bought her duplex flat in Willow Rise two years ago. Now the flat, which she sank her savings into, is practically worthless with no recourse to compensation. 'This is my home. Well, it used to be,' Leerasiri said through tears. 'I thought I'd found my forever home. I paid to fix everything, the bathroom, the ceiling, everything. And now that's all gone.' She says the building's problems were severe enough for her to try to move, but with the notice to leave in place, she was unable to sell. While the council have told her she will be rehoused temporarily, they have not said when this will happen. 'I knew that I had to move out one day because of all these problems in the building, I knew, but I can't sell now. The building is not safe as a seller,' she said. 'I can't sign and lie to say, 'yeah, it's safe to sell', so I'm stuck.' Leerasiri has been forced to rely on the kindness of her employers to store her heavier belongings, meaning many of the things she needs for day-to-day life are no longer in her flat. With the waking watch ongoing and no money for temporary accommodation or news of when she may be rehoused, she has been forced to stay in the flat, sleeping on the floor as her bed and mattress are already in storage. The watch costs the council about £3,000 a day and, since taking over the responsibility to fund it from the previous management company on 21 May, it has spent more than £50,000 in order to continue it. This process does nothing to make the building itself safer, allowing only for people to be evacuated more quickly in the event of an emergency. One fire marshall on the watch described the buildings as 'incredibly dangerous', and said that in his opinion, 'nobody should have been here for a while'. Chris Penfold-Ivany who has rented in Willow Beech for more than 15 years, said the buildings 'are not fit for purpose' and that the residents had been let down. 'The companies that have ran these buildings, one after the other, have let this place fall apart,' he says. 'And now it's so far gone it would cost them millions to fix it, so we've just been left behind in this mess, and someone needs to take responsibility. Whoever these are, cannot be allowed to just leave this.' Penfold-Ivany has cancer and is taking medication to treat it as well as dealing with the after-effects of a liver transplant. His medical needs have made it hard for him to move his possessions from his 13th-floor flat, and he has resigned himself to the fact that, without help, he will have to leave much of his life behind once he is forced to move. Though he says the council have told him they will be able to house him somewhere, he is wary of the prospect of leaving the area as his family, who are based in Kirkby, help him with the day-to-day chores that are are made more difficult because of his ill-health. Anneliese Midgley, the Labour Knowsley MP, has said that the council is doing everything it can to address a 'deeply distressing situation that has left 160 households in my constituency at risk of homelessness through no fault of their own', and that she intends to bring the situation to national attention. 'The immediate priority must be to ensure everyone is safely rehoused,' she said. 'The private companies responsible must be held to account. It's encouraging to see the government engaging with this issue and exploring ways to help.'
Sky News
08-06-2025
- General
- Sky News
'A catastrophic scandal': Inside the tower block so dangerous residents face being kicked out at any moment
The moment we step into Willow Rise, the smell of damp is overpowering. There are water stains across the carpet and rotten wood on the doors. Around the corner, there's a hole in the wall, barely patched up with a piece of polystyrene sheet. We're meeting a resident on the 13th floor of the building in Kirkby, Merseyside - but the lifts are broken and wires hang out of the service panel. Like everyone living here, we will have to walk. The disrepair in this block is everywhere you look. It has now been deemed so unsafe by Merseyside Fire and Rescue Service that they are days away from serving a rare prohibition notice on this tower and its neighbour, Beech Rise, meaning residents will have to leave with immediate effect. In total, 160 households here face instant homelessness. After climbing 13 flights of stairs, we meet Chris Penfold-Ivany. 'A catastrophic scandal' He has terminal cancer, and after chemotherapy and a liver transplant, that climb is now the only way he can get up to his flat. He tells us it's making him breathless. He can no longer get his prescriptions delivered, as the drivers won't come up all the stairs. "It's a catastrophic scandal that we have been left like this," he says. He has lived in this flat for 15 years and has watched the block slowly begin to fall apart over the last decade. He tells us that numerous complaints have achieved nothing. "I'm going to say it," he says, "this is another Grenfell in the making." 'Nobody can live like this ' A few floors down, Arunee Leerasiri opens the door to us, in floods of tears. The stress of the last few weeks has left her anxious and overwhelmed. There are boxes everywhere, bare hooks on the walls where pictures hung. She is packing up her life just three years after putting her life savings into buying this flat. Her elderly mother has come to visit, but she had to hire removal men already to take her mattress into storage as she couldn't manage without the lifts. Tonight, and until they are told they must leave, they will sleep on the floor. "I can't eat, I can't sleep," she tells us, through tears. "Sometimes, if I'm honest, I can't even think. This used to be my home, and now I look around and I don't even recognise it." "Nobody can live like this," she adds. 'Danger, 415 volts' She shows us a video she filmed just a few weeks ago, of one of the electrical risers on the ground floor. None of us can quite believe what we are seeing - water is pouring through the ceiling, directly on to fuse boxes and electrical wiring. Arunee takes us down to show us the cupboard. The water has now stopped but there are damp stains all over the floor and around the electrical equipment. The water pipes and electric boxes are just inches away from one another within the cupboard. One of the boxes, marked 'Danger, 415 volts', is rusted through. Next to it, there is a notice stuck to a resident's door telling them a leak has been identified in their flat - and as a leaseholder, they will be responsible for paying to fix it. "Tell me, how is this safe?" Arunee says. "Why is this building allowed to be open for the public, as a dwelling, with this kind of set-up?" Hidden owners and a plea to the government Merseyside Fire and Rescue tell us they have been serving enforcement notices on the building managers for years, to no avail. They have now been told there is no money for the millions of pounds worth of repairs that will be needed to bring the blocks up to a safe standard. They have mandated a 'waking watch', where teams physically patrol the buildings daily to check for fire risks, without which they will serve the prohibition notice and tell residents they must leave straight away. Knowsley Council has stepped in to pay for this temporarily - at a cost of £3,000 per day. Their deputy leader tells us, though, that the money will soon run out. Where to go? With a complex management structure and several owners, managers and agents over the years, the council says it doesn't even know who is to blame for the disrepair - or who even has the legal responsibility for maintaining the buildings. It says discussions are ongoing with central government about whether any extra help - or money - can be provided to try to fix the mess. Right now though, all the residents can do is wait. With no date to leave and no idea if anything can be done to keep the buildings open, they are spending every day fearing the call to tell them they have to go. They can only hope there will be somewhere for them if they do.
