An elderly woman kept awake by water crashing from her home’s faulty guttering has waited three years for repairs to be made.

Phyllis Pattle, of Fulmer Close, Hampton, first alerted Paragon Community Housing to the problem in 2011 when rain water poured onto the wall of the ground floor flat and caused mould to grow in a bedroom.

The housing trust supplied fans to keep the mould at bay but did not repair the gutters above the bedroom.

Mrs Pattle said she and her daughter have been kept awake at night by pouring water because of the overflowing gutters.

She added: "The water just booms down. We’ve started wearing ear plugs when there’s a lot of rain, but it’s ridiculous that we have to do so."

Paragon board member Councillor Kate Howard said the building's guttering was put up 40 years ago and is not capable of dealing with heavy rainfall.

She said: "It’s not an easy job for the association to undertake as they would need to carry out work on the entire complex rather than just this block.

"It can take time and an awful lot of money to plan such works."

A Paragon spokeswoman acknowledged the building's guttering system needed to be replaced but said it is a "large job" which requires specialist services to be delivered through their planned maintenance programme.

The spokeswoman added works to replace the guttering on the whole building has been added to a schedule for the new financial year and they will inform residents when they know an exact start date.

Internal repairs to Mrs Pattle's flat will be completed this month.