Council finally clears rubbish from area suffering plague of 'super rats' in Milton Keynes

The Citizen described last week how desperate mum Faye Joyce had been complaining for months about the rat infestation in and around her Stantonbury home.

She was convinced the problem was a pile of filthy debris that had been fly-tipped outside her garden for months. Nearby garages crammed with rubbish were also adding to the problem, she said.

But Faye's numerous calls to the council's environmental health department had seemingly fallen upon deaf ears and nothing was done.

Meanwhile rats the size of small cats are running about inside the cavity walls of her Ormonde home and defying numerous attempts to kill them. Over the months, her landlords have spent £1,500 with a private pest control company to try to eradicate them.

They are immune to poison and can even eat the bait from a trap without setting off the spring mechanism, says Faye, who has a young son.

"They really are super rats. And they're huge ," she said. "They're scared of nothing. People say rats and nocturnal and wary of people but these run right up to you when you are in the garden. and they scurry around in my wall cavities all day and every day."

The strain of living with so many rats and the noise of them all around her has made Faye will with stress and anxiety.

"I am at my wit's end. I am fighting a losing battle and I just don't know what to do," she said.

Faye said environmental health officials have been out three times to visit the rubbish dump outside her home .

"They've just inspected the rubbish but done nothing to get it removed," she said.

The citizen contacted the council to ask what they could do. This week we received a reply saying they had sent workers to clear rubbish behind Faye's house.

"That's really good but it's a shame they didn't listen to me sooner," said Faye."And the garages are still as bad as ever and crammed with rubbish."

A council spokesman said: "We’re grateful this was brought to our attention. We can assure local people that we take action on environmental crimes such as these, working with landowners to do so as we have legal restrictions on private properties.

"We’ve been behind two successful prosecutions for dumping at these garages. One man was fined £600 plus ordered to pay £300 costs. Another was fined £460 plus costs. We can also issue a £250 Fixed Penalty Notice for fly tipping, and have done this here too."