86-year-old Solihull woman hits out after having to foot £180 bill to remove decomposing fox - The Solihull Observer

86-year-old Solihull woman hits out after having to foot £180 bill to remove decomposing fox

Solihull Editorial 2nd Jul, 2021 Updated: 5th Jul, 2021   0

A DEAD fox has ended up costing a Solihull senior citizen £180 after everyone she turned to for assistance in removing it told her they could not help.

Letty Roberts, 86, spent two and a half hours on the telephone appealing for help after waking one morning to the dreadful smell of a rotting fox lying dead in her front garden.

She said she called the council to ask if they could remove it but was told it was unable to help and then received similar answers from environmental health and Age Concern.

The Citizens Advice Bureau tried on her behalf but was unable to get anywhere so suggested she call pest control.




“I called them and they said, they’d come and take it away, but it would cost £180 and they wanted the money up front.

“I mean, I’m lucky, I could afford £180, but what if another little old lady couldn’t? What would happen then?


“Would it just be left to go on stinking somewhere?”

Letty said the nearest she got to any practical advice was to pick it up herself and put it in the bin in a plastic bag.

“That may be fine for an able bodied person but I’m 86,” she said.

“It stank to high heaven and was crawling with maggots.

“And when pest control they were all dressed in protective suits and wearing long gloves.”

Letty later tracked down her local councillor to complain and subsequently received an apology from the Solihull Council, but by that time it was too late.

“I got a fulsome apology but I didn’t get my money back and £180 is a lot of money.

“Everyone I spoke to said ‘ring the council’ and if they won’t help, where do you go from there?”

Solihull Council said: “We usually only remove dead animals from council maintained land not private gardens.

“However, given these particular  circumstances, we could have made an exception and assisted.  We would therefore like to extend our apologies to the resident concerned.”

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