A disabled 89-year-old man who struggles to open his front door has waited two years for an automatic one and said without one he feels “helpless”.
Gerry, whose full name and location cannot be shared due to security concerns, said he doesn’t have the strength to open his door and struggles to leave his Little Venice block because the council won’t install a stair lift due to fire safety concerns. A promise by Westminster City Council to install an automatic door remains unfulfilled two years after the pledge was made.
He told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “I was promised a door but they keep on making excuses. Someone visited lately and I thought we were making progress but I still haven’t got it.”
This isn’t Gerry’s first time dealing with Westminster City Council. He established the local residents’ association and regularly campaigned on behalf of residents on his estate.
In 2023, he pushed the council to install an automatic entry door in his building, which he said took six months to get done. During that time, his health got worse and he became weaker, making it difficult to open his own front door.
The former Royal British Legion Chair said: “The door downstairs was heavy to the death and so the only way I could go in or out was by pushing the door open with my shoulder. That gave me a frozen shoulder and I had to go to hospital.”
Now Gerry is desperate to get his front door replaced and has been asking for two years. He said: “I’m severely disabled. I have diabetes and I have arthritis in both hands. No one to date has shown me how I can open the door. One of my hands opens but my right hand doesn’t, it’s almost claw-like.
“That’s one problem. The other thing, up to the prime time, is I was living on my own. My wife died – it must have been 16 years ago – and I survived without someone to help me but then I started to fall over and that was the start of it.”
Earlier this year Gerry was walking to the toilet when he lost balance and fell, breaking his hip. He was rushed to hospital and underwent hip surgery and spent three months recovering.
Now the retired salesman sleeps in a hospital bed in his living room and relies on carers to get him out. Gerry has no intention of giving up his pursuit for a new door and phones Westminster City weekly for an update. And that’s because to Gerry, this flat is more than just a home.
It is where he nursed his sick wife before she passed away and where he launched his family businesses after retiring from a decades-long career selling mining products. He knows everyone in the block, where he has lived for the past 40 years, and can’t fathom moving.
He also promised his wife he would never leave and keeps her ashes nearby as a reminder.
He said: “I think the council thinks old people are stupid. I just feel because of my age, why spend all that money on an old man who won’t be here much longer? But I’m determined to stay around. I won’t let them win, I want to stay around a long time.”
Gerry said the council also refused to install a stair lift on the ground floor claiming it is a fire hazard. However, the 89-year-old said the building opposite his has one and without it, his carers have to lug two heavy metal ramps around just so he can go down three stairs and exit the building.
He said on the way in, his carers have to wait for another person to come by to help push his wheelchair up the ramp. He said: “I had to find a reason, mentally, on why they were finding all these different reasons why I shouldn’t have it. I had to consider other people in the block. I honestly know everyone in this block and I don’t think they would object to me having a lift.”
Little Venice councillor Lorraine Dean said it took the Labour-run council one year to inform Gerry he couldn’t get a stair lift, which she said was far too slow.
She has been working on the pensioner’s behalf to have an automatic door installed and claims funding approval has to go through three separate departments before the job can begin. She said: “They are taking an extraordinary amount of time to resolve this issue. If I hadn’t been involved, it would be taking even longer.
“I have written two speeches about Gerry and I’m always emailing them, at least once a month, asking for an update and I’m always getting excuses.”
She added: “This is the council’s policy, to get older people to live more independently in their own home for as long as possible, so it’s not like I’m going against the policy.”
Yet Gerry still waits. He said: “I think I’m entitled – the same as anybody else who lives here. I want security.”
According to the council, Gerry’s door requires a specialist contractor, which it is in the process of arranging. It has offered Gerry a free key safe to give visitors access to the property.
The delay is said to be due to the Building Safety Act 2022, which requires additional consents and applications to change a front door set in a high-risk building. According to the council, a stairlift cannot be fit because the stairs are not wide enough and the lift would cause a fire hazard.
Each block is subject to an independent fire risk assessment so adaptations may differ between buildings. The council has also agreed to arrange for an assessment to be done on how carers are managing the portable ramps.
A Westminster City Council spokesperson said: “We are sorry for the delays to the adjustments to Gerry’s property. The council cares about the wellbeing and safety of its residents and is working at pace to address the issues raised.”
Adrian Zorzut is a Senior Local Democracy Reporter covering Westminster, Hammersmith & Fulham, Kensington and Chelsea, and the City of London. A contributor to Harrow Online, his reporting focuses on local government, housing, planning, transport and public policy, helping residents understand the decisions and issues affecting their communities.
