Mum with one leg forced to crawl up concrete stairs to flat as 100 homes lie empty

dailyrecord.co.uk:

A disabled mum with one leg is forced to crawl up 17 concrete stairs to her flat while 100 ex-council homes lie empty nearby.

Tracey Whiteside, 48, has been told she is a priority for a new accessible home by council chiefs, but has waited almost four years for them to provide one.The mum-of-one from Linwood faces an agonising trip to and from her second floor flat across stairs which she says have been urinated on - and her painful climbs have also seen her dodge needles left by drug users.Meanwhile, we previously reported how up to 100 ex-council homes have been deserted in Ferguslie, just over a mile away from Tracecy, with Renfrewshire Council set to bulldoze the properties.Tracey, who says her ordeal is wreaking havoc on her mental health, has now hit out at a lack of action over boarded-up and crumbling buildings throughout the area - where people in desperate need could be housed.She told the Record: “I’ve been forced to crawl up concrete stairs on my hands and knees to get to my front door whilst there is 100 homes lying empty down the road.“Why can’t one of those homes be adapted to suit people like me?

But the council will probably knock them down and sell off the instead of building new homes as well. It’s happening everywhere and people like me are left prisoners in our own homes.“I can’t even go for a bath because my whole flat is unsuitable.

I even need to crawl about my home to get the toilet. It’s soul destroying.”Tracey lost her leg in August 2020 after giving in to 40 years of trauma brought on by a congenital disorder and neurofibromatosis which saw her break her leg when she was just 16 months old.She also suffers from non-cancerous tumours in her spine as a result of her condition, which has left her