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Tenant furious with neighbour’s out of control garden that reaches first-floor window

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A tenant is furious with his local council for not steeping in when a garden grew so out of control that it reached his flat on the first floor.

Paul Lefeuvre has battled tirelessly to get Bristol City Council to cut the almighty mass of bushes and brambles outside his council flat for the past six years.

But despite repeated pledges to tackle the hedges, which are the responsibility of the tenant who lives in the ground floor flat, he says the council has done nothing.

It has now got so bad that Paul, 49, can’t even dry his washing outside - and damp is growing in his bedroom because he’s forced to hang it in there.

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Furious: Paul Lefeuvre says the council should step in to gut the bush (SWNS)

He also fears he will be trapped inside if a fire breaks out, because the bushes are blocking his escape.

Letters from the council dated September 2015 claim Paul’s complaints haven’t been dealt with sooner because of a ‘staff shortage’.

But he said the wrangle has been ongoing for six years and is starting to affect his life.

He said: “It’s a joke. It’s making me depressed getting up seeing that all the time.

“I’m doing washing and sticking it up in my bedroom and there’s mould in my bedroom now because I can’t get into my garden.

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Overgrown: The brambles are reaching into the windows of the first floor (SWNS)

“Even the postman said a couple of weeks ago, 'how can you live like this?’ The council keep telling me the same old story - 'we’re dealing with it’.

"I thought if I stop paying my rent they will do something so last year I stopped to see what they would do.

“They wrote me a letter to say they are going to deal with it, but then I had a letter saying because I’ve not been paying I’d be kicked out.”

Paul said the problem started when a woman moved into the flat below about six years ago.

He initially trimmed back the bushes himself, but they’ve been left to grow again to an enormous state again.

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No room: Paul has to hang his washing indoors because of the overgrown garden (SWNS)

Apologising for not taking any action, a Bristol City Council spokesperson said: "A member of our housing team has been out to visit the site and spoke with the affected neighbour and we will be instructing our contractor to get the garden cleared in the next few weeks.

"Unfortunately limited resources have prevented us from carrying out this work sooner.

"This job was originally booked with our garden service contractor, but they currently have a backlog of work and are unable to carry out the work until November, so we have now gone to another contractor.”

Top pic: SWNS