A MUM and daughter are delighted after a gas pipe they claimed was getting bashed around by binmen has been replaced with a much safer alternative at the former’s home.

Jackie and Joanne Brixton feared the pipe outside the Fortis sheltered flat in Cranham Court would explode as it allegedly kept getting hit by large communal bins during collections.

However, after an article in the Worcester News last Thursday an engineer, believed to be from Fortis, fitted a new much smaller pipe that loops immediately back on itself.

Fortis told us last week the pipe was re-clipped in August last year after the issue had originally been flagged up but “no other incidents or repairs” had been reported since.

A spokesman for the sheltered accommodation provider said yesterday, there was no record of the latest repair on their system.

Joanne, 44, said the engineer had come to repair her 67-year-old mum’s boiler on Tuesday anyway and so removed the old pipe and fitted the new one at the same time.

She said he told her “another nick would’ve split” the pipe after she pointed out the issue to him.

Joanne previously said of the old pipe, the gas supply could be cut off from the vulnerable residents or worse, would “cause a major explosion.”

“I have actually told a worker from one of the crews that it’s a gas pipe they’re hitting over and over, and he said ‘I’ll go tell my boss in the truck’ but I never heard anything after that,” said Joanne.

She said the issue had also been reported to the city council but a spokesman told us for the original article: “We have no knowledge of this issue and are not aware of any evidence to support this claim.

“However, a waste service supervisor will visit Cranham Court to investigate.”

Clare Greensall, Fortis regional manager, communities and neighbourhoods (West), said previously each home has its own gas central heating system and “we wouldn’t be able to say if the pipe was ruptured who might be affected.”