Under-fire gas firm in a hole lot of new trouble

Published: 1 October, 2010
by PETER GRUNER

CLAIMS about the “appalling” standard of repairs by workers  laying gas pipes in Islington prompted a new row this week.

Novelist Nina Bawden is the latest to complain after her home at the Angel was flooded, causing thousands of pounds worth of damage, when workmen left a gaping hole in the road.

Ms Bawden lives in Noel Road, close to retired company chief executive John Murphy, 66, who, as reported in the Tribune last week, ended up spending four hours in a police cell following a row with a gas fitter.

Mr Murphy had refused to unlock his front door for the fitter to leave following a row about an Aga stove which stopped working after the road was dug up.

The gas fitter, working for contractor Skanska, claimed he had been “imprisoned” although the charge was later dropped.

This week, Ms Bawden’s daughter Perdita Kark spoke of their “appalling” experience when a basement was flooded on four occasions, damaging many priceless artefacts.

Following cabling work outside the house the previous day, Ms Kark found the cellar had flooded overnight with about six inches of water.

The problem appeared to be a hole that had not been filled in.

Ms Kark said: “A new coffee machine was destroyed, the wooden box holding £3,000 worth of wine had fallen apart, a £40 bottle of Glenmorangie got broken and the whole cellar full of wooden racks of bottles was covered in mud, rubble and soaking wet.”

Ms Kark described how workmen scooped up most of the water. She used 15 towels to soak up water and whisky and then used a blow heater to dry out the cellar.

“My mother Nina Bawden has lived in the house for 35 years but it has never to my knowledge flooded before,” Ms Kark said. “It seems they needed to repair some pipes and move a meter below our house and someone may have forgotten to back-fill the hole.”

She was promised that the failure to fill in the hole would be rectified immediately and that dryers and dehumidifiers would arrive the following day.

But the next day, following a massive downpour, the cellar flooded again. “The heater blew, fusing an entire circuit throughout the house,” she said. 

“Labels were soaked off wine bottles, antique wooden furniture sat in two inches of water and an antique Afghan rug was drenched.”

It took more than two hours for a supervisor to arrive, according to Ms Kark. 

He took a few photographs and left, she said, leaving no contact number or advice.

For a brief period Ms Kark could not use her office, her mother could not use her dining room and access to the kitchen was restricted.

She added: “Most of the guys working on the street have been easy to deal with but the company most definitely needs to rethink how it deals with faults, mistakes and emergencies.

“I only managed to get hold of phone numbers that possibly make a difference by intensive internet research and a massive number of aggressive phone calls.

“They have since filled in the hole but every time there is a downpour it leaks again. We’re hoping that the current infill will hold.”

A spokesman for the National  Grid – responsible for the cable laying work being carried out by Skanska – said a full investigation into the Kark flooding is being carried out: “We don’t think this flooding was a result of anything that we or Skanska were doing but we are trying to find out what happened. There have been various contractors working in the road including the water authority.” 

Aga saga – Boss ‘sorry’

THE boss of a construction company apologised this week to a retired businessman who spent hours in a police cell following a row with a gas fitter over an unlit Aga cooker.

Ian Stewart, managing director of Skanska, which is replacing gas pipes in Angel, visited the Noel Road home of John Murphy, 66, to say he was sorry the row had got out of control. Mr Murphy said: “He was unhappy that a row with one of his staff should end up with me being put in a police cell. He will be refunding us £200, what it cost to get someone else in to re-light our Aga.”