A GWENT family woke yesterday to discover their ten foot garden wall had collapsed into the street below after torrential rain caused a landslide.

Jonathan Miller, 37, of Glen View Terrace, Ynysddu, was first told about the horrendous damage to his property by the postman.

"He handed me the letters and said, 'You've had a landslide.'

"I thought he was winding me up. Then I looked over the top and saw half the garden lying in the street."

The property sits on a steep hill and the collapsed wall towered around ten foot above street level.

The wall itself was condemned yesterday along the front of Mr Miller's property and that of two of his neighbours and was cordoned off for safety reasons.

Mr Miller said the council engineers voiced doubts over whether the wall would be there at all by the end of the weekend.

Because of the unstable wall and the pile of debris in the street, Glen View Terrace has been closed to traffic.

The steps down from the house are full of rubble, earth and other debris washed down by the landslide.

The only way the family can get from their front door to the street is by climbing over two neighbours' garden walls.

With his young family, eight-month old Tia and two-year-old Phoebe, carrying on with everyday life is proving a struggle for Mr Miller and his partner Linda Jeffries.

Mr Miller is also angry as he and neighbours believe poor drainage of council maintained roads and drains is what caused the landslip.

But, he says, the council has told him because the collapsed wall is on private property, it is not their responsibility.

He says the council has even promised to send him a bill for the barriers and bollards they used to close off the road and contain the landslip – a bill Mr Miller says he will not be paying.

"I think I'm going to have quite a battle on my hands in the next few weeks," he admits.

But he said Ynysddu councillor Jan Jones has shown him great support and stayed at the house for several hours yesterday, taking photographs of the damage and of the river-like flow of water running through Mr Miller's garden.

Councillor Jones said: "The problem affects the walls of two or three properties, although Mr Miller's is the only one which has actually come down.

"I believe there needs to be a full investigation into this and what has caused it before we take things any further."