FREEZING weather left an Ipswich family housebound after the staircase to their flat became too icy to use.Diane Seymour and her children Lee, one, and Curtis, three, were too scared to leave their home in Maidenhall Green when snow hit the county because the stairs were coated in three inches of ice.

FREEZING weather left an Ipswich family housebound after the staircase to their flat became too icy to use.

Diane Seymour and her children Lee, one, and Curtis, three, were too scared to leave their home in Maidenhall Green when snow hit the county because the stairs were coated in three inches of ice.

Miss Seymour, 22, said: “I have rung the council numerous times and asked them to come and grit it.

“I have to go up one big flight of stairs and then another flight to get to the front door.

“Me and my two children are housebound and there is another family that have got children who are finding it hard to get up and down the stairs.

“A few people have slipped and hurt themselves.

“I have got a three-year-old and a one-year-old and I have to carry him up in the pram and that's a big no no at the moment.”

Damien Adolphine, 20, a friend of Miss Seymour's slipped on the stairs and injured his leg earlier in the week.

He said: “I have a little graze on my shin and one on my knee and when I walk I get a pain in my leg as well. I am going to go to the doctors to get it looked at.”

Miss Seymour said she had asked Ipswich Borough Council, who own the flats, if they would supply a bag of grit for her to scatter on the staircase.

She said she called them back in November when the weather started getting colder but claims they said it was not a priority.

She said she cannot use salt on the stairs because there are too many of them and too much would be needed.

A spokesman for Ipswich Borough Council said they would send someone round to look at the situation although this was not standard practise.

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