Washing lines 'a health and safety risk'

Residents have been ordered to remove washing lines from balconies – to prevent "heavy and wet" clothing from falling onto people below. Croydon Council managers wrote to thousands of tenants telling them that washing lines and three-pronged rotary clothes lines must be removed for health and safety reasons. The fear is that residents will overload their washing lines and their clothes will be blown off in high winds – causing injury to anyone walking underneath. An original letter saying that washing lines were an "eyesore" and should be removed was ignored by most tenants, forcing the council to threaten legal action.

The new letters, sent out this week, inform council tenants that if they do not remove the washing lines from their balconies they face losing their homes. But angry residents say that even if they did have gardens to hang up their washing, it would get taken by thieves. Michelle King, 35, a mother-of-two said: "It is laughable really how the council is concerned about the attractiveness of a clothes line and our clean laundry. I just threw the first letter away but then we got another one later threatening legal action, which really shocked me.



"With two children and a small flat I don't know how else I can get my clothes dry. It doesn't look bad or lower the tone of the flats. What lowers the tone is the graffiti around here and the council should look at that instead of sending these letters out." She added: "I am not taking my smalls downstairs to the communal laundry to dry, no way. They could get stolen or anything could happen to them."

Tenant Darren Green, 45, said: "When I saw the letter I just laughed. I mean, how can they expect us to take it seriously? They are worried about wet clothes falling off the balconies and hitting people and seem to think that is a health and safety issue." He added: "Lots people don't have gardens and the best way of drying clothes is to put them on a washing line on the balcony – people have been doing this for hundreds of years and I've not heard of any being killed by it." A Croydon Council spokesman confirmed that tenants who did not remove the rotary clothes lines immediately were warned they face legal action.