The story of home-owners who were trapped for almost 20 years in Livingston homes built of crumbling concrete has now been told in a new programme produced by Radio Scotland.
In the programme presenter Mark Stephen hears from three of those who fought or almost two decades for a new home after the Deans South estate was cleared of tenants in the early 2000’s.
The programme features quotes recorded by Isabel Baxter remembering her husband Joe, who died just weeks before he could move into the new home built by Springfield Homes for the family last May.
The programme has broadcast as the problems of Reinforced Autoclaved Aerated Concrete or RAAC have spread far beyond the new town estate built by Livingston Development Corporation in the late 1960s.
RAAC has also been discovered in council housing across West Lothian in council homes and across Scotland, prompting a National campaign of which one of the Deans South householders, Kerry Macintosh is a vice- chair.
Kerry told the Local Democracy Reporting Service that listening to the radio programme, which also features contributions from her and neighbour Phil Cavan, “took us all right back to the start of this.”
She added: “It’s been really emotional for us all. I’ve cried every time I’ve listened to it, thinking about what we all had to go through.”
Kerry said she was pleased that the also programme remembered Joe Baxter and his wife, who had joined her and Phil in the Grampian for a house for house. “It’s important that Joe was heard”, said Kerry
A national petition has been created demanding a public inquiry be held at Holyrood on the the RAAC scandal and it effects on householders. In the programme Phil tells presenter Mark Stephen that” there has to be a government solution.”
Kerry described it as shocking the troubles that home-owners across the country were finding as their homes are identified as having the same roofing materials as was identified in Deans South.
More public protests outside the Scottish Parliament are planned.
The Deans South story can be heard on BBC Sounds at :- https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0029h2t
By Stuart Sommerville, Local Democracy Reporter
The Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS) is a public service news agency. It is funded by the BBC, provided by the local news sector (in Edinburgh that is Reach plc (the publisher behind Edinburgh Live and The Daily Record) and used by many qualifying partners. Local Democracy Reporters cover news about top-tier local authorities and other public service organisations.
