UNDER fire River Clyde Homes chiefs who have left tenants waiting up to 11 YEARS for repairs will be told by the council to take urgent action on 'slum' housing in Inverclyde.

In an unprecedented move all parties apart from the SNP, at last week's full council lined up to support a hard-hitting cross party motion by Councillor Tommy McVey which piled pressure on Inverclyde's largest housing landlord.

During an impassioned debate the Greenock councillor was joined by other elected members who rounded on the RCH as they set out desperate and, at times, upsetting cases they have been left trying to resolve while failing to get acceptable responses.

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At one stage the Inverclyde South elected member brandished a copy of the Tele's front page story on mum Agnes Marshall and the fear for her daughter's life to hammer home the message to those who said he was 'having a go' at River Clyde Homes.

In the end the motion was carried and Chief Executive Louise Long will now write to RCH demanding they develop and implement an action plan to resolve the catalogue of long term repairs.

At the meeting Councillor McVey, seconded by Labour's Councillor Natasha McGuire said: "This isn't about strategies, policies, spreadsheets and statistics. It is about people and the impacts on their life.

"Despite engaging with River Clyde at all levels I still have constituents living in damp houses and in very, very poor conditions.

"Something has to change, this has been going on for far too long, and we need to help these people. This has been going on right in front of our faces. It is an absolute shambles.

"Look at the Greenock Telegraph over the years, not just in recent times, at the people waiting on repairs and living in poor conditions."

As he listed a number of his cases, and added that speaking to other councillors there were more.

He said: "Let me tell you about Mr and Mrs Smith an elderly couple in the Cornhaddock area, lovely people, the type of people who never miss a rent payment first with the council and then River Clyde Homes, they look after their garden, sweep their path, mop the stairs. If you were going to pick your neighbours in Inverclyde you would pick them.

"They came to me in 2018 to say they had reported damp in 2012. Their daughter who lives down south has been involved, I have been involved for the last five years and that has still not been resolved, 11 years and it still has not been resolved.

"It is dreadful, just dreadful."

Councillor Colin Jackson, who has been one of the most outspoken on the housing crisis in his six years as a councillor said: "I can only go on what I see as a ward councillor where I have Oak Tree and Cloch Housing as well.

"That is River Clyde Homes have a large number of sub-standard occupied slum houses within their current housing stock and are failing in their duty as a responsible social landlord."

He went on to set out his own appalling list of cases he has had to deal with and challenged the SNP opposition to the motion.

He said: "We need to focus on River Clyde Homes. I would go far as to say 100 per cent of my complaints are River Clyde Homes and the wait you have to get anything done, the excuses, after excuses, after excuses."

Councillor David Wilson also backed the motion and called said that historically the housing stock in Inverclyde had been poor.

"I struggle to support the second amendment in my experience the problems out there apply to one RSL. I don't think the other registered social landlord deserve to be singled out. River Clyde Homes is the problem.

He went on to say that the problems to the days when Inverclyde Council had responsibility for the housing stock.

Councillor Wilson said: "We handed over council housing that was not in good health at all which then became social in a stock transfer that wasn't in good health. RCH compounded the problem by in early years making some bad decision in the early days and made bad decisions for the best part of a decade which did not help their way forward."

On the day the SNP submitted an amendment to replace Councillor McVey's motion calling on a letter to all registered social landlords instead telling them they were valued and asking for information in respect of their properties including total number of outstanding repairs.

Putting forward the amendment Councillor Elizabeth Robertson, SNP group leader, said: "We know there are often issues that we must raise on behalf of our constituents the reason we feel we can't support this motion is that we feel we already have the communication routes, the mechanisms and channels of recourse to legitimately bring up these issues when they arise and geneally they work.

This was disputed by Councillor Jackson who said:"I don't recognise these lines of communication. We have ward meetings with River Clyde Homes and nothing ever gets done."

Speaking out against the motion SNP's Councillor Pam Armstrong said that the motion experience raising RSL's other than one mentioned "Our difficulty with this motion is that although the intention may not be to have a go at RCH I am afraid that is the way I read it and that is how it reads. We want further action, that is the substance, we want action."

When summing up furious Councillor McVey responded to Councillor Armstrong by holding up the Tele front page from earlier this week with mum Agnes Marshall calling for help for her daughter alongside Councillor Jackson.

He said:"Having a go, would you not have a go if you were this lady? But this is not about having a go, it is about taking action."

The SNP continually argued Tommy McVey's motion had no actions and  was just criticism.

At the end the Provost, chairing the meeting, which included representations from other councillors intervened to say that he was happy there was an action in the motion asking for an urgent plan to tackle the issues.

Labour councillors joined with Conservative Councillor David Wilson and independents Lynne Quinn and Provost Drew McKenzie to vote in favour of Tommy McVey's motion.

All seven SNP councillors voted for their own amendment including Councillor Chris Curley who declared an interest because he sits on River Clyde Homes board but decided to stay for the debate. Councillor Graeme Brooks who also sits on the board declared an interest and left the meeting.