The Peterborough Evening Telegraph
St Michael’s Gate issues to be ‘all in the past’
Problems discovered at the St Michael’s Gate estate in Peterborough will be a thing of the past, a senior city council officer has promised, after action was taken to improve the lives of homeless families living there.
Service director for community and safety Adrian Chapman made the personal pledge after revealing the wide-ranging measures implemented by the authority in the wake of criticisms about the standard of some of the homes.
Inspections of all but one of the 72 properties leased by the council from private housing firm Stef & Philips have revealed a “wide range” of repairs which need to be carried out, but each property remains habitable it was declared at Monday night’s meeting.
Homeless families living on the estate have complained about the properties being very cold due to poor quality (and expensive to run) storage heaters, which was borne out by the inspections.
But, it was revealed during the meeting that the council has won funding to install central heating and to connect homes to the gas network both in St Michael’s Gate and in other places across the city, albeit this will not begin until March next year.
Stef & Philips will also carry out a survey for replacement doors and windows at the start of December, it was stated. St Michael’s Gate hit the headlines more than two years ago when the Peterborough Telegraph revealed that the families living on the estate were being evicted by landlords Paul Simon Magic Homes through Stef & Philips, its managing agents.
The latter than signed a deal worth nearly £1 million a year for the council to rent the vacant properties as temporary accommodation for its homeless families. The council insisted that if it did not agree to the deal another authority would have moved its homeless families into the estate instead, with the council having to pay to look after them.
Monday’s meeting was chaired by Hazel Cottrell from the Parnwell Residents Association, who told Mr Chapman: “This was a horrendous situation for the residents and mistakes were made. How can you make sure this won’t happen again?”
Mr Chapman replied: “This won’t happen on my watch. You have my personal commitment this won’t happen again.” Stef & Philips was invited by the residents association to attend the meeting - and one last month -but did not respond to the invitations, it was stated.