Rats invade family home
YHN PLEDGE TO ACT OVER RODENT INFESTATION IN KENTON
RATS are driving a family from their Tyneside home.
Johnathan Kirkup has had to shovel rat droppings down the toilet and said the rodents scurry around at night.
Now Your Homes Newcastle is urgently seeking to rehouse jobless Mr Kirkup, his partner and their two-yearold son Cruze.
“It is horrible living here,” said the 26-year-old.
“You are frightened they are going to come out at night when you are asleep or end up in my son’s bed. And to make it worse, I hate rats.”
He said they first appeared at the
Mostyn Green,
North Kenton, Newcastle, around his son’s first birthday last September.
And he said they’ve made his life “hell”.
“I’ve had to pick up rat droppings and put them in the toilet - it is disgusting,” he claimed.
“I’ve had to pull the carpet up and bin it and I can hear them at night, scratching away and chewing through stuff.
“One of them even ran across my kitchen floor the other night and it was massive.”
He has now contacted his MP to try and intervene, while he’s even called pest control.
Both Mr Kirkup and his partner Amy Burini, 25, have photographed some of the rat-inflicted damage.
Your Homes Newcastle said it will look at moving the family out “immediately”.
“We are sorry that Mr Kirkup and his family have experienced issues with rats in their property and are working to try to resolve this as quickly as possible,” said Liz Archer, Assistant Director of Housing Services.
“We understand that Mr Kirkup would like to leave the property and we have spoken to the family to discuss their options for alternative accommodation, which they can move into immediately.
“Our repairs and maintenance service has visited the property several times, working to fill in holes and block other areas where rats may be able to get through. “New grates for the gullies near to the property have also been ordered to stop this potential access route.
“The parts needed for this are expected to arrive later this week, in the meantime temporary covers are being added until the more permanent ones can be put into place.
“Newcastle City Council provides a pest control service for the treatment of rats and post treatment advice if relevant.
“In the last 12 months the pest control team have acted on and attended to reports from three properties on this street. From each of these reports, treatments and the necessary follow up visits have been carried out.”
You are frightened they are going to come out at night when you are asleep and end up in my son’s bed