Stories of tragedy and comedy from the social housing front line

Chancers, villains and desperate cases… a year in the life of an anti-social behaviour officer

N ONE example, Nick recalls being lambasted by Only Fools And Horses actor Roger Lloyd-Pack at a residents’ meeting. “Being called incompetent by Trigger,” he admits wryly. “That’s the kind of thing that stays with you.”

Elsewhere, the reader is taken from pathos to snort-inducing comedy and back again in just two sentences, as in the case of Larry.

“I still think to this day, he’s immortal,” jests Nick, who is originally from Liverpool but now lives in south London with his wife.

“He was 5ft, a heavy drinker with a complexion of a faded lemon and just the most cartoonish potbelly you’ve ever seen, caused by his renal functions breaking down. He always looked on the brink of collapse but year after year he thrived.

“One day there was a flood in his home on the 22nd floor and when the plumbers went in – Larry was not at home so they forced entry – they found a fully operational cannabis factory.

“They fixed the leak, phoned the police and as they were waiting for them to arrive, Larry turned up and went into the flat. Everything started flying out of the window – lights, cannabis plants, soil bags, the lot.”

By the time the police arrived, all the evidence was on the pavement and there was nothing they could do to link Larry directly to the crime.

“It was a perfect example of what you know and what you can prove being two different

‘Called incompetent by Trigger from Only Fools And Horses – that sort of thing stays with you’

things,” says Nick. Neither the housing estate in question nor any of the locations are revealed and all names have been changed to protect identities. Even without the potential legal ramifications if Nick did identify them, it is a wise choice because some stories would be just too haunting to read otherwise.

Such as Albert, for example, an 80-year-old tenant with mental health issues who died alone in squalor with his cats after repeatedly refusing help from the council.

His body lay in his flat undetected for two weeks until neighbours reported a terrible smell. When he died, he’d been writing out Christmas cards to himself from his cats.

“Even for somebody like me who had done the job for so long, there are cases that will always stay with you and Albert is one of them,” Nick says candidly. “There are a lot of people out there living on their own who don’t have family or friends to support them. There are probably a lot more Alberts out there to be honest, I just happened to be the person who found out about that particular Albert.”

Despite the humour, Nick treats his subjects with respect. He wrote the book partly out of an increasing frustration with television programmes and societal depictions of people facing unimaginable hardships and/or