Disabled council house tenant left paying to shower at Leith swimming pool as damaged wet room floods property
Kalvin Borwick has been left unable to use his shower after water poured into his and his neighbours’ properties.
A disabled council housing resident in Edinburgh has been left paying £3 every time he needs to shower after being left without a usable wet room for more than a month.
Kalvin Borwick, 64, first reported issues with his wet room on March 22 after water began to flood his property in Gunnet Court, Muirhouse.
However, despite multiple plumbers visiting his home, little progress has been made on fixing the issue over the past seven-and-a-half weeks.
Mr Borwick, who has mobility issues, has now resorted to traveling to Leith Victoria Swim Centre to pay £3 every time he needs to shower.
In one video shown to the Evening News, water can be seen pouring from the upper level of Kalvin’s home onto the lower level, passing what appears to be electrical cables and lighting fixtures attached to the ceiling.
Kalvin, who has lived in the property since 1994, said: “It’s like having a shower underneath the stairs.
“I’ve got a chairlift and when it started leaking, I had to try and leave the chair halfway up the stairs because it would have started dripping on top of that.”
He initially tried to contain the flood himself before getting a chap on his door from his neighbour.
He said: “When it started leaking, I spoke to the woman underneath me and she wasn’t getting any water through, so I kept using the wetroom to wash and using an old wet and dry vac I had to soak up water after me.
“But last Sunday she came down and told me that she is now getting water through so I haven’t used it since then.”
He added: “I think I’ve had plumbers in five different times now.
“One of them said that they were going to try and contact the firm who installed it but I’ve heard nothing since then.
“The council also closed my case because a plumber had already been in, so I had to contact them again.”
Despite not using his shower for more than a week at this point, water is still affecting both his and his neighbours' properties.
Mr Borwick said: “My other next door neighbour has now said that they’ve been getting water through.
“I haven’t used the shower in the past week so I think that water is slowly leaking through from somewhere.”
In response to Mr Borwick’s concerns, City of Edinburgh Council has said that progress has been made on the case and a further inspection took place at the property earlier this week following the failure of a previous repair.
It was added that arrangements are now being made to carry out the necessary works as a priority and the council are in contact with the tenant directly to provide further updates.