Peabody is investigating allegations its contractors called a disabled women living in the Cally a “dummy” – during a 10-month project to fix her damp flat.

Faith Jennings, who is also deaf, has been complaining about her Copenhagen Street flat's state of disrepair for six-years but the her housing association only agreed to fix her leaks in December. Works are still ongoing.

Sheila Jennings has slammed it for leaving her step-mum to live in a "disgusting", mouldy flat for years, then taking months to fix it and trying to "cut corners" by plastering over the damp.

She told the Gazette: "The whole of her bathroom was soaking wet, all black with mould everywhere and even when I cleaned her wardrobe the green mould inside.

"My mum is disabled and lives with my autistic brother and their home is riddled with damp; you can smell it on their clothes."

Faith has been sleeping in the living room since December due to damp above her bed.

Sheila says some contractors refused to work in the property at first, owing to the smell, and claims to have heard workers belittling Faith.

Sheila said: "She [Faith] writes on bits of paper to communicate and find out what's going on. She asked them [the contractors] to communicate with me but she had left her phone on and I could hear it in the background. He was talking to someone else and said; 'She's driving me up the wall coming in here with bits of paper, the dummy'.

"When I got down there no one was there so I can't say who said it, there's been so many people there." Sheila has made an official complaint.

Peabody wouldn't say what firm employs these workers.

Sheila also alleges workers have left cement in the bath, so her step-mother is unable to use it.

A Peabody spokesperson said: "We are grateful to the family for raising this with us. Our team is in weekly contact with them to try and resolve these issues, and we believe the root causes of the leaks have now been fixed after a number of visits.

"We now need to make sure that everything is cleaned up properly, internal decorations to fully repair the damage are completed quickly, and that the bath is cleared and ready for use.

"Separately, we are concerned to hear that contractors may have communicated inappropriately with Ms Jennings. They have always demonstrated empathy, understanding and flexibility from what our staff have seen, but we will of course be following this up."