A HOUSING association has apologised after a family have endured a week of freezing weather without a boiler.

The boiler in Michael Procter’s house in Ash Grove, Darwen, broke on Thursday last week, and he phoned Together Housing asking them to fix it.

But he said his family have been waiting more than a week for it to be repaired by the social housing provider, leaving them with no hot water.

Together Housing apologised for the wait but said that it had to prioritise repairs depending on the circumstances of each individual tenant, with the more vulnerable tenants being pushed up the list.

The family do have heating but only from an electric fire in the living room of their property, while they have an electric shower to wash.

Mr Procter said he was ‘really annoyed’ by the delay and said that Together Housing had ‘left the family to freeze.’

Mr Procter, who lives with his wife and three children Jayden, four, Zac, 12, and Declan, 14, said: “The boiler is totally dead and has broke.

“I’ve rung them eight times and they keep telling me different things.

“At one point, we were given an appointment to repair the boiler but when we phoned again it had been moved back.”

He said the family were told by the housing provider they weren’t a priority because they had an electric fire and electric shower and no elderly person living in the house.

He said: “We’ve not used the electric shower really because of the cold atmosphere in the house which isn’t good for the children with all the illnesses going round at the moment, so we’ve had to boil up hot water and give them a bucket wash instead.

“We’ve also had to get our own electric heaters in to warm the rest of the house up as the electric fire is only in the living room.

“We’re just really annoyed and Together Housing have left us to freeze.”

Lee Winterbottom, Head of Planning and Delivery for Together Housing, added: “We apologise to Mr Procter. No one wants to be without heating, especially when they have a young child and we’re sympathetic to Mr Procter’s urgency.

“However, we have a number of tenants with differing needs and we have to prioritise carefully for tenant safety. We were confident that, as Mr Procter had access to electric heating and hot water, he and his child were not in immediate danger. The repair will be completed today.”