Residents at Chestnut Court, in Bury St Edmunds, say they have been 'fobbed off' over continual heating and water problems in their building.

On Saturday, tenants had to rely on blankets and hot water bottles to keep warm after the building's boiler failed for the second time in a month - while temperatures outside plummeted.

This week Havebury Housing Partnership, which owns the scheme, said it was investigating the incident as it sent apology letters and gift vouchers to residents as compensation for the delay in fixing the fault.

But tenants said they had also had 'milky' water with an oily smell from their hot taps for several weeks - despite repeated requests for the problem to be fixed.

Val Simpson, who lives at the scheme, said: "We were without hot water or heating all day on Saturday, from 4am to 6pm.

"Some of the residents are over 90 and they can't move to get warm, but no-one seems to be taking any notice of this."

Shelagh Green, Havebury's head of housing, apologised for Saturday's incident, adding: "This type of problem does not happen very often, and when it has we usually have our contractor on site within three hours.

"We are currently investigating what happened between our out of hours service provider and the maintenance contractor, to ensure delays like this don't happen in the future.

"In the meantime, an engineer has revisited Chestnut Court to ensure all is well."

She the scheme would take priority in a review of boiler control systems, which is due to start shortly.

A spokeswoman said engineers had found no evidence of water smelling like oil, and said it was believed its cloudy appearance could be down to air in the system or naturally hard water.

"Havebury will carry out individual checks if residents still have any concerns," she said.

- For a full report, see the Bury Free Press

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