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Ullapool tenant appeals to Highland Council for help making home wind and watertight


By Louise Glen

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Douglas Stewart is calling for his home in Ullapool to be made wind and watertight.
Douglas Stewart is calling for his home in Ullapool to be made wind and watertight.

A MAN living in a Wester Ross village who simply wants to make his house wind and watertight says Highland Council has let him down.

Douglas Stewart (52) from Quay Street, Ullapool says he is at his wits' end after countless visits to his home from officials and yet he says he still has a gale blowing through his house.

With increasing household fuel bills and bad weather never far away, he is now calling on the local authority to do the right thing and get the problem fixed.

Mr Stewart, who works in his local supermarket, said he has made a number of complaints about the way he has been treated by the local authority, after he was promised before he even moved into the property last September that the gaps in the doors, windows and walls would be resolved.

"In the meantime my bills are going through the roof trying to keep the house warm."

Mr Stewart said: "I was offered this house when my relationship with family members broke down last year. I was very pleased to be offered the house, but before I even signed the lease I was guaranteed that the very obvious problems with the house would be fixed.

"There is a draft running through the house. I have tried to get help to sort out the problem. The council have been out a few times and they have said that they will do the job, but it is very difficult to pin them down. In the meantime my bills are going through the roof trying to keep the house warm. There is water coming in the back and front doors and when it rains I have to put towels down to collect it. And there is a draft from under the sink that puts a chill through the whole house.

"They came out in February and said that someone would be out to fix it. It hasn't happened, and it should have.

"This is a council property and as much as anything they must want to keep it wind and watertight. I have tried countless times to speak to the maintenance manager, or his boss, or his boss's boss and no one ever seems to phone you back. I want to know when the work is going to be done. I have waited almost a year now."

A council spokesman said: “We are endeavouring to resolve this matter as quickly as possible and will again make direct contact with the tenant to try and arrange a suitable date and time to for our joiner to attend. This will need to be within the limits of current Covid-19 restrictions.”

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