A WATER firm has apologised to three families whose gardens have had raw sewage pumped into them for more than a week.

Robert and Sandra Hunt, of Eliot Close, Liden, and their two sets of neighbours have had to live with the smell of sewage day and night after a sewer pipe burst last Friday.

Thames Water has sent engineers to try to find the source of the problem, but have so far been unable to do so – and the couple, who have both recently battled cancer, have said they are fed up of waiting for the problem to be solved.

”I think it’s disgusting,” Robert, 57, said. “They came out last Friday and did not do anything. I had to phone them again to get them to pump it out of the garden because it was up to the height of the step. The stench is getting too much and with the wife and her breast cancer she really does not need it right now.

“Her immune system is weak and I am frightened she might catch something from it.

“There are bits of toilet paper coming up and the water is putrid. It’s only about five foot away from the back of the house.”

It is not the first time Thames Water have been slow to react to a sewage leak in the town – last August residents of Castle Dore had to resort to using buckets to keep the flood at bay while they waited more than 13 hours for an engineer.

But Robert, who himself was diagnosed with prostate cancer last year but has since been given the all clear, said he had been told that it would not be until May 14 that the firm could try to locate the equipment with the appropriate equipment.

“They need some metal detector or camera to find the missing drain and that’s the earliest they can do it,” he said. “It makes me laugh that in this day and age it will take two weeks to get this sorted.”

A spokesman for Thames Water said: “We are really sorry for the mess caused and we are making sure this is cleaned up as a matter of urgency.

“We are investigating the cause and, in the meantime, have a tanker to clear the drains to prevent the situation getting worse.”