The Local Paper Isn’t The Best Forum, Sometimes…

Angry David Oultram has been left without gas for more than a week – after engineers claimed they could not work in his cluttered home.

I'm not entirely sure ‘cluttered’ is the word. ‘Cluttered’ implies he has too much stuff, too many books, nick-nacks, etc. Something I'm surely guilty of...

This isn't ‘cluttered’; this is the first stage of hording:

Maybe there’s a previous gas engineer under all that…

The unemployed 56-year-old believes Moorlands Housing has put his life at risk by denying him heating and hot water as temperatures dip.

I can’t see how – those layers upon layers of accumulated stuff must insulate the house pretty well!

… furious Mr Oultram, who suffers from arthritis and sciatica, believes the engineers could have worked around the clutter and should not have turned off his gas.

Mr Oultram, who lives in Wardle Crescent, said: "My mother and sister both died a couple of years ago, and they left me their belongings, and I have a lot of things in boxes and bags that have built up over the years.

"But there was enough room for them to do their work. I used to work as a painter and decorator and I sometimes had to work in a cupboard where you couldn't swing a cat.

"I think these gas engineers were just being awkward."

Well, no. No they aren't. You cannot expect anyone to work in those conditions.

And did you really expect that, having seen the pictures of your house, any reasonable person would agree with you, rather than with the gas company?