A single father from the Mardy in Abergavenny who found his three-year-old child choking on his own vomit has claimed Monmouthshire Housing Association are responsible for putting his child's life at risk, due to their 'inept installation of a faulty ventilation system'.

Last Tuesday, St Andrews resident Tony Newton awoke in the early hours to cries of extreme distress coming from his son Lewis's room.

Rushing immediately to his aid, Mr Newton was mortified to discover Lewis vomiting.

Thankfully Mr Newton was able to quickly revive his ailing child to full health by removing him from his room and taking other safety measures.

Yet, for Mr Newton, this incident was clear proof, of a lingering long held suspicion - that his child's health was being compromised by a poorly installed ventilation system which had been fitted in his son's bedroom last summer.

"In February of 2009, Lewis and I moved into a ground floor flat in St Andrews Crescent," explained the upset father.

"Last winter I started to notice how damp was forming in the bedrooms and bathrooms of the flat and the frames of the windows were turning black and rotting.

"During a brief conversation with the previous occupants and other residents, I was disappointed to learn that perpetual damp had been an ongoing problem in the block of flats as a whole.

"Consequently I contacted Monmouthshire Housing Association which eventually agreed to arrange the installation of a ventilation system which would hopefully solve the problem."

As the ventilation system, installed by a private contractors, was fitted in August of this year, Mr Newton only became aware of its obvious defects during the recent cold snap.

The ventilation system runs from the internal vent in the hall through the length of Lewis's room to the external vent.

In retrospect both the appearance and fitting of the ventilation system seems questionable to Mr Newton, who argues, "They could have just fitted the whole system to the bathroom's exterior wall."

Nevertheless, as Mr Newton explained. "A Monmouthshire Housing Association officer visited me a week later to check on the work and because I had high hopes that the system would do its job and prevent further damp, I said I was happy."

Sadly, Mr Newton's hopes were dashed twofold, when instead of preventing the damp from spreading, the ventilation system actually escalated its growth.

"I first noticed flaws in the system when I saw dust particles being blown from the vent in the hall. Now I'm no expert on these things but I knew this wasn't right.

"Secondly, little droplets of water began to appear on the exterior of the ventilation tubing and drop to the floor, damaging the contents of the room.

"Around the same time Lewis began to feel quite poorly in the middle of the night and whenever he spent any significant time in his room.

"I took Lewis to the doctor and they seemed to agree that in all likelihood, he was probably feeling poorly because of the conditions he was living in and all the moisture and God knows what else in the air.

"I contacted Monmouthshire Housing by phone a few times to voice my concerns and I always received the same response, which was they'd phone me back, but they never did.

"It got to be very tiring, because not only did I have to use other people's phones to try and get through to them, but they seemed to be passing the buck all the time."

The final straw came last Tuesday when Mr Newton found his son vomiting.

"I just lost it then," revealed the frantic father, "I made the relevant enquiries the same day and demanded something be done."

Finally, two days later, the company contracted by Monmouthshire Housing visited Mr Newton's flat and rectified the problems with the ventilation system.

Mr Newton said, "When they visited they told me that not only was the vent in the hall broken, but the ventilation tube had not been sealed or insulated properly.

"More worryingly the vent leading to the exterior in Lewis's room was not boxed off, which I understand is the responsibility of Monmouthshire Housing Association."

Mr Newton added, "I am obviously glad the problems with the ventilation system have been rectified, but it should never have come to this in the first place. I feel that Monmouthshire Housing Association, through their actions, or lack of action, have directly put my child's health, and even life at risk, I think at the very least an apology would be apt."

The Chronicle contacted the Director of Housing and Communities at Monmouthshire Housing Association, David Morris, who explained, "We were contacted by Mr Newton on December 7 regarding the issues he was having with his ventilation system. One of our officers visited the property and arranged for the contractors to return on December 9 and carry out the necessary maintenance work.

"This to my knowledge has now been carried out and an Environmental Health Officer has also visited the property and stated, "The flat in my opinion was of efficient provision for heating and ventilation."

When the Chronicle queried Mr Morris as to why no checks were made by Monmouthshire Housing when the ventilation system was installed, he responded, "We are responsible for thousands of jobs and are not able to check every work undertaken or contracted by us. It is impossible."

In regard to Mr Newton's claims that he tried to contact Monmouthshire Housing Association countless times to no avail, Mr Morris explained, "Due to the recent cold snap calls to Monmouthshire Housing have doubled of late, but if Mr Newton can furnish us with details of the times and dates he called then we will definitely look into it and carry out a serious investigation, because service standards are very important to us."

Mr Morris added, "We appreciate that winter is an extremely difficult time for our tenants, especially in light of the rising energy costs. We are encouraging tenants, if they can, to keep the heat at a constant level, rather than the extremes of keeping it on full blast and then turning it off for alternate periods, because this can lead to problems.

"In Mr Newton's case we arranged to put insulation on the ventilation pipes, and that is not something we have ever had to do before with any of these systems, and as far as the boxing off of the external vent is concerned, that is purely a cosmetic thing."

When faced with the more serious claim that the actions of Monmouthshire Housing Association may have put Mr Newton's child's health at risk Mr Morris replied, "That's a very, very serious accusation and I couldn't possibly comment on something as important as a child's health."