Rochdale Boroughwide Housing managed a property where a toddler died due to mould exposure in 2020 (Picture: Getty Images)
Tenants of damp and mould-riddled homes have said they’re being told ‘too much breathing’ is what’s created their health problems.
Residents of social housing managed by Rochdale Boroughwide Housing (RBH) in Greater Manchester add they want to band together to take action against the landlord.
RBH is also known as the group that managed the property where in 2020 toddler Awaab Ishak tragically died from damp and mould exposure, despite his parents having consistently raised the issue.
An inquest subsequently found RBH was responsible for several shortcomings prior to the child’s death.
On Tuesday night, tenants with the housing association got together at the White Lion pub, The Mirror reports, to discuss their ongoing collective struggle with living conditions, including their children developing respiratory trouble.
Attendees at the meeting agreed things have only gotten worse since RBH established its damp and mould taskforce in December 2022.
Tenant Sean Doyle told the paper: ‘We’ve been living there for over nine years and we’ve had every problem you can name with the place – and it’s been going on for eight years now.
‘We’re not parents who would put our kids through that, I’d die for them. That’s why we’re here today to make sure my kids’ health and their future is sorted.’
He added his 10-year-old son has been diagnosed with asthma as a result of the conditions at their property.
Sean went on: ‘Every person with an issue needs to get onto it, cruel as it is – no one else wants their children to end up with the same fate as the little boy who died.
‘I’m a dad and I can’t seem to stop this from happening to my kids.’
Other attendees shared similar stories. Leah Nuttall described how the air in her bedroom is so heavy that’s she’s taken to sleeping downstairs.
She said: ‘I was due to get a tonsillectomy at the end of last year and a few weeks before my surgery there were questions over whether I could get it because my lymph nodes were so swollen.
‘This was because of the mould. I was fighting an infection and my asthma was getting worse. It was touch and go whether I could get the surgery.’
She claims that when their complaints were raised with RBH, she was told the mould was ‘due to them breathing too much at night.’