House of horrors: Council workmen find 100 TONNES of rubbish in pensioner's home

There were no human bodies inside, but Merv Jones's home was truly a house of horrors.

Every room in the three-storey terraced house was filled from floor to ceiling with an assortment of bric-a-brac and rubbish.

The junk was even stacked in the hall close to the front door, making it almost impossible to get inside and both front and back gardens were a mess.

After years of complaints from neighbours in Grimsby, council officials finally moved in to tackle the job of emptying the building.

Incredibly they removed more than 100 tonnes of material, filling skip after skip after skip.

The extraordinary amount and array of bric-a-brac was collected over decades by the eccentric 73-year-old owner.

Old rifles, ammunition and swords were found inside, along with thousands of everyday items you would find at a car boot sale, such as dolls, electrical equipment, toys, pictures, books and ornaments.

When asked about the clear-up Mr Jones said:'It's not pleasant living here. I wanted to clear it myself. I was trying to get it done.'

The pensioner was put up in a hotel while his house was emptied and the North East Lincolnshire Council intends to reclaim the cost of the operation from him.

Local residents regarded the property as a blight on their neighbourhood.

Alyson Thomson, 58, a sales manager who lives next door, said:'It is hard to imagine how he did it, but I believe he was living in the house because I would hear his front door open and he would go inside and not come out until the next morning.

'Every room was crammed from floor to ceiling with rubbish, it has been complete hell living next door to him for five-and-a-half years. I am horrified that he had a dog living there with him.

There was a handgun, swords and nearly a dozen air rifles, they found propane gas and chemicals and they had to stop work whilst the fire brigade handles those chemicals.

'I have been living next door to a potential bomb, filth and rats. On the day they started clearing he challenged me in the street saying "what have you been saying about me?"

'I told him that he lived like a filthy pig and that was insulting to pigs and the police cautioned me saying they didn't want to provoke the situation.

'He does not wash and wears his clothes until they stand up on their own. He has been collecting this stuff for 40 years.

'No normal person would live like that so there must be something wrong with him. To me the house is unfit for human habitation.'

Mrs Thomson said council officials clearing the huge amounts of rubbish found six skeletons of dogs. Windows upstairs shattered years ago and pigeons moved into the loft.

Mr Jones originally ran a second hand shop in his street.

He bought and sold a variety of household items as well as model engineering equipment, plant machinery and tools.

The business has been closed for a decade, but the house nearby was crammed full of far more than simple 'left overs' from the business.

The three-storey terraced house is privately-owned and in good condition would be worth at least £100,000.

It took a team of council contractors and officials almost three weeks to clear the building.

Mr Jones would sit on a bench nearby and watch his house being emptied into a succession of skips.

Council officials are believed to be investigating two other addresses thought to be owned by Mr Jones and containing more bric-a-brac.

It is not known what he intends to do with the house that has just been cleared.

A warrant was granted at Grimsby Magistrates Court uner the 1936 Public Health Act which allows authorities to take control of 'filthy and verminous properties.'

John Waite, the council's environmental enforcement manager, said he believed the house had no running water or gas and was unsure about where the electrical supply had come from.

'Primarily this has been done for the welfare of the occupant, but also for residents.'

Pest controllers were called in to lay bait for huge rats 'the size of small cats' living in the house and contractors were praised by neighbours.

Tina Blanchard, 41, said:'It's awful, really horrible and they deserve a medal for the job they are doing.'

March of the dustbin Stasi: Half of councils use anti-terror laws to watch people putting rubbish out on the wrong day

More than half of town halls admit using anti-terror laws to spy on families suspected of putting their rubbish out on the wrong day.

Their tactics include putting secret cameras in tin cans, on lamp posts and even in the homes of 'friendly' residents.

The local authorities admitted that one of their main aims was to catch householders who put their bins out early.
The shocking way in which the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act - an anti-terror law - is being used was revealed through freedom of information requests made by the Daily Mail.

MPs and civil liberties groups last night accused councils of using the draconian powers for trivial reasons.

Shami Chakrabarti of Liberty said: 'Snooping appears to have become the favourite pastime in town halls up and down the land.

'Common sense has gone out of the window and instead of putting out more bins, councils spy on householders as if they were terrorists.'

Tory communities spokesman Eric Pickles said: 'Under Labour, the rights and liberties of law-abiding citizens are being eroded through plans for ID cards, sinister microchip spies in bins and abuse of anti-terror laws by councils.

'Taxpayers' money is being wasted on bankrolling an army of municipal bureaucrats who have watched too many episodes of Spooks.'

The Mail requested information from all of the 474 councils in England. Of the 151 which replied, some 77 - more than half - said they had used the legislation in the last three years for suspected 'domestic waste, littering or fly-tipping offences'.

Although it is ostensibly an anti-terror law, the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000, or RIPA, is worded so loosely that it can be used to justify surveillance operations for a variety of reasons.
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These include spying to 'protect public health' or the 'economic well-being of the UK'.

This means that councils can use the powers granted by the Act to monitor families' treatment of household waste.

In Lincolnshire, West Lindsey District Council uses the new powers to place motion-activated cameras on lamp posts to catch homeowners putting their bins out at the wrong time.

One officer told an undercover reporter: 'In some areas, particularly where there is terraced housing, we have a problem with people putting their black rubbish bags out three or four days early.

'When they have been left in alleyways or at the rear of terraced properties, it is difficult to identify exactly who has placed them there.

'The cameras are hidden in tin cans or put on lamp posts and allow us to monitor who is coming out of which property and leaving their rubbish. Sometimes we are able to put these cameras inside peoples' homes that overlook the alleyways.

Shami Chakrabarti

Shami Chakrabarti: 'Snooping appears to have become the favourite pastime in town halls up and down the land'

'These are usually residents who have complained to us about rubbish being dumped outside their house on the wrong day.'

The council said it had been able to hand out 'several' fixed penalty notices on the basis of the evidence it had obtained.

Officers at Southwark District Council also admitted that they had mounted cameras on lamp posts to spy on residents suspected of leaving rubbish out at the wrong time.

The revelations have raised fresh concerns about the Home Office's plans to create a 'Big Brother' database of every citizen's e-mail and internet records.

Ministers say that councils will not have access to the information.

But critics point out that RIPA, which was passed as anti-terror legislation, is now being routinely used by town halls - and the same could happen with the database.

Phil Booth, of the NO2ID campaign, said that public bodies were 'assembling the tools of a totalitarian state'.

He added: 'We are no longer living in what most would recognise as a free society. This is not justifiable or proportionate.'

Mark Wallace, of the TaxPayers' Alliance, said: 'It is crazy that so many councils are using anti-terror legislation to spy on their residents. It must cost a huge amount for all these concealed cameras, just to give a few people relatively low-level fines.'

Other local authorities which gave details of how they used RIPA included Lewes District Council in East Sussex.

It admitted that the Act was used to gain evidence on residents who persistently left rubbish out at the wrong time.

South Bedfordshire council also admitted going through phone bills inside rubbish bags to identify who had left them outside.

Officers also electronically tagged certain types of rubbish to find out if they had been dumped illegally.

Wycombe District council in Buckinghamshire put an electronic tag on rubbish left outside a shop to see if it was taken.

A spokesman for the Local Government Association, which represents councils, said: 'The LGA has written to councils to say that surveillance should not be undertaken unless it is absolutely necessary and proportionate to the crime that's being investigated.

'Councils have a duty to protect their residents and are tuned in to the worries people might have about surveillance.

'These powers are essential in making sure that benefits cheats, fly-tippers, rogue traders and other serious criminals are caught and brought to justice.'