A NEWPORT woman facing an 'ongoing' problem with rats in her house says her housing provider has told her there is no evidence the animals are present - despite having taken pictures of them.

Toni McKinley, who lives in a Newport City Homes (NCH) property on Stanford Road in the Ringland area of the city, says that the issue started in August last year.

"I noticed rats outside my block," she said.

"I was finding rat/mice droppings in my property, so they [NCH] did sent out pest control and laid traps and poison.

"We caught a rat under my sofa, it's just been ongoing since."

Despite the visit, on Wednesday, January 19, Ms McKinley says she was told by NCH that there was no evidence of rats in her property.

"I showed pest control images, but they’re not clear enough," she said.

She says she was told that none of the photographic evidence presented constituted proof of rats.

A NCH spokesperson said that the rats were in fact located in a nearby shed.

“We are working with Ms McKinley and also her neighbours to remove waste that had been put in a nearby shed, it is this waste that was attracting pests," they said in a statement.

"We have been in contact with specialists in the Environmental Health team at Newport City Council and we will continue to liaise closely with Ms Mckinley to address her concerns.”

Ms McKinley, however, asked why pest control were sent to her house if the rats were not there.

"If there's no evidence or anything of rats, why they have sent out pest control to my property to cover homes and lay traps and poison?" she asked.

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The problems with the property appear to date back to before Ms McKinley moved in.

Previous tenant Elizabeth Ferguson said that she also experienced issues, although these were to do with the building itself rather than unwanted guests.

"When I moved in the patio door wasn’t even sealed up tidy," she said.

"Neither were the windows."

Ms Ferguson said that she had to fix the issues out of her own pocket.

"I was living there for four and half years," she said.

"I can’t even say the amount of times I decorated because my wallpaper would just fall off [due to damp]."

A NCH spokesperson said: "Throughout her tenancy, we worked with Ms Ferguson to fix maintenance issues she reported to us.

"This included fixing the patio door lock and doing a thorough damp survey so we could identify what was causing it and how we could work together to resolve it.

"The survey identified actions Ms Ferguson and Newport City Homes could do to reduce condensation, damp and mould in her home.

"This ranged from installing new extractor fans and fire doors to opening windows to improve air circulation and cleaning mould spots with an HSE approved fungicide.

"Ms Ferguson didn’t report any further issues at the time."

Newport City Homes said that they were sorry that Ms McKinley and Ms Ferguson "feel we have let them down".

The pledged to continue to work with both women to fix any problems in their homes.

“However, we must be able to fully assess and inspect properties before we can do any work to resolve the problem," they said.

“If a customer declines our request to go into their home or doesn’t agree with the proposed solutions from our expert surveyors, we can’t address the problem.”