A VULNERABLE grandfather with a crippling disease was left without heating for a whole week because the gas company cut off his supply and didn’t send anyone to fix it.

On January 4, Northern Gas disabled the gas supply to Dervin Simpson’s house in Fartown following a gas leak.

The company promised the grandfather-of-seven someone would be back to fix the problem – but no-one turned up.

Meanwhile freezing temperatures continued to hit Huddersfield and the 67-year-old was left shivering in the cold for seven days.

Mr Simpson suffers from a painful blood disease called Sickle Cell Anaemia which he said gets worse in the cold weather.

It was only after a call from the Examiner that a spokesman for Northern Gas has apologised and said an engineer would start repair work yesterday.

A spokesman said: “We apologise for the delay in carrying out the repair. This is an exception and not our usual standard of service.

“The recent bad weather conditions have resulted in a huge increase in the number of people making calls to the National Gas Emergency Service. These are running at record levels for our network which has resulted in a backlog of cases to be dealt with.

“We have to treat these calls as our first priority as there could be real danger we have to deal with.

“Unfortunately, this means that other priority jobs cannot be dealt with as quickly as normal. We are very sorry for this and would like to apologise to anyone who is affected.”

Mr Simpson told the Examiner the blood disease he has gives him crippling pains all over his body and he’s been desperately trying to keep warm.

The father-of-eight has recently returned home after a spell in hospital just before Christmas, and worried neighbours have been bringing hot meals around to his house.

He said: “I’m very angry because every time I contacted the gas company they promised me they would come and they were so nice about it, and they said someone would come straight away and no-one ever did.

“I’m a sick man and I’m supposed to have heat in my house – the pains get worse when it’s cold weather – they are all over my body and I have rheumatism too.

“All the gas company brought me was a little electric heater but it’s not enough– it is so cold in here.

“I rely on the gas to heat my house and to cook my meals.”