November 2007, welcome to Warden Street.


I did know of the areas reputation before i moved here, i was just very shocked to realise i didn't know just how bad things were in certain parts of it, and Warden street, being a dead end road ( i would say Cull De sac, but dead end is much more fitting) I'd never been on the street before. This is surprising as I'd been a driving instructor for 10 years and thought I'd seen every road in the area. In fact i remember thinking the first time i saw it, that it would make an ideal place to practice a 'turn in the road' or three point turn as it's better known.


Half the houses were boarded up, but as the council had said the street was being revamped and filled with decent families, I'd believed them and wasn't too worried. Half a dozen houses were in various stages of refurbishment, which i assumed explained some of the rubbish lying around in the road. Had a private landlord made all these promises i would have been very worried. But, i was being moved there by the council, under their quality landlord scheme, which i thought at the time actually meant i would have a quality landlord. As they had put it to me, these were landlords who maintained their houses to a good standard. It wasn't long before i realised this was far from the truth.

We'd moved into the house on Novermber 20th 2007, that same night i had water pouring in through the girls bedroom ceiling. I had to move them into my room with me for the night as i feared the ceiling would come down. The next day the landlord fixed the roof, but never did get around to fixing the sagging ceiling. Also the guttering was old and rotten, which allowed water to stream down the walls outside, so it wasn't long before the damp which had been painted over, returned. The central heating broke down completely on the 23rd of December, and a plumber eventually arrived on the 2nd of January. So I'd spent the whole of Christmas and the new year boiling kettles and pans for water and using two borrowed hallogen heaters. He managed to partially fix the boiler, which was a combi boiler. The only problem was i had to have the heating on to get hot water. This became a big problem as we neared June. Meantime i had been getting onto the council and the landlord and a string of people had loked at the boiler but hadn't managed to fix it.

Other problems, some evident in the first few weeks, some only after living there a few months included a leaking toilet and bath overflow (discovered when water came through the kitchen ceiling), an electrically wired smoke alarm systen that didn't actually work, leaking windows, slugs, mice, ants, woodlice (not just a few, there were whole colonies living in and trooping through the house). Wallpaper sarted to come away from the walls and paintwork and plaster began to crumble and fall away due to the damp. Fuses that tripped if i had too many lights switched on, the list really was endless and i'm sure i'll remember more. The houses had basiclly been 'bodged' not refurbished and it wasn't any comfort to know that there were other tennants with similar and even worse problems. Despite endless phonecalls to the council and the landlord most of the problems were never fixed. I even had environmental health inspect the house in march 2008 which is when i found out thet a decision was soon to be made as to whether or not to demolish the whole street and the neighbouting one. The report concluded that the house needed, new windows, rewiring, guttering, major repairs to the roof, partial replastering and a new damp course. They also said that they would only insist on these repairs being carried out if the houses were to remain and not be demolished. Well by October i'd had enough and moved to a house further down the same road, with a different landlord. As soon as i knew the house was empty i was straight onto the landlord, who agreed to let me move in immediately. Yet again, i'd jumped out of the frying pan and into the fire.

How did i end up living in a place like this you might ask? I suppose it was a combination of bad situations that i found myself in and didn't quite handle in the best possible way at the time and bad choices on my part.


Five years ago i was young(ish) free and single. Having left a very abusive relationship with what i could fit in a van while my ex partner was at work. I was in a pretty poor state emotionally and financially. I'd walked away from a house that my ex partner and i had a joint mortgage on, I a car loan and a loan for home improvements in my name. After a couple of months living with my sister while my possessions were stored in my mums garage i found a nice little flat in the village where I'd grown up. By this time the debts had risen, not having worked for a month as i needed time to sort my head out. I returned to my work as a self employed driving instructor and also had a nice little earner, selling craft supplies on eBay.

So began the mission to rebuild my life and my finances. The money was coming in, but i was very good at spending, fuelled largely by depression, i can now see looking back. But what did that matter when i earned enough to pay the credit card and loan payments and would soon have the settlement from my house to pay things off.



Gradually over about a year i was working less and going out more, enjoying the single life.

Throughout this time my ex partner dragged his heels over the house settlement, and my plan to pay my debts with the cash was looking less likely as time ticked on. When he finally settled, over two years later, I'd missed payments, incurred charges, penalties and extra interest. He'd devalued the house and the settlement was only a third of what i owed. My only options were an IVA or bankruptcy. I scraped through with an IVA and narrowly avoided bankruptcy, which meant i got to keep my possessions and my car.


During this time I'd unintentionally fallen pregnant with twin girls no less. Despite taking the contraceptive pill, rather erratically at times i have to confess. I had a difficult pregnancy, with complications which resulted in me giving birth to my two gorgeous girlie's, Rachel and Rebecca, seven and a half weeks prematurely. All of which had added to my financial problems.



My little flat, which was above a takeaway and a hairdressers and as I'd discovered was freezing during the winter, due to old, inefficient storage heaters wasn't really the place to bring up premature twins. Housing benefit which i would have to rely on as I'd be living completely on benefits for a while wouldn't cover the cost of a house near to my family. So after a year living with my sister, whom i had always known had some form of undiagnosed problem or learning difficulty, which my health visitor suspected was a mild form of autism, having worked with autistic children and adults previously, i accepted a house from the council. It was a private tenancy on a street which was being revamped and all the houses were being refurbished to high standards (laughs hysterically at this point). As i had Bob Hope and no hope of getting a council property anytime soon i accepted it. You see, up until the age of 35 I'd never expected I'd ever need an affordable council property. So had never added my name to any waiting lists.



Anyway, so begins my account of life on Rotherhams answer to The Chatsworth Estate.



Right, time to save and have a coffee.

Who would have thought that in this day and age, people actually lived like this. Had i not experienced it for the last nineteen months, i wouldn't have believed it myself.


Dirt, dust, mould, rats, mice, dog foul, rubbish, litter, drugs, drink, broken glass, old furniture, career benefit claimants. All to be found on one short row of terraced houses near the centre of Rotherham, South Yorkshire, early in the 21st century.


Warden street, or as a few of us have come to know it "The Chatsworth Estate" could have been plucked straight out of 1970's Salford and could just as easily have been called "Beasley Street".

But despite a promise by our now Prime Minsiter to "Rid Canklow of the blight of Warden Street" It's still here three years later. His promise was made when along with John Prescot, who was brought up in Rotherham he announced plans to redevelop the area.

I've never been much of a Margaret Thatcher fan, but at least Salfords Beasley Street was demolished literally weeks after she saw the living conditions there for herself.