VILLAGE CUT OFF AS CABLE THEFTS HIT PHONE LINES.

Byline: Sandish Shoker ; Mitch Sayers

VILLAGERS have been left without phone and internet connection since cable thieves struck two weeks ago - costing businesses thousands of pounds.

Parts of Brinklow have been left without phones and internet since May 18 after 2,500 metres of underground cable was stolen from nearby Pailton.

Alert buttons used by elderly residents to contact family, carers or social services in an emergency are also unusable.

Geoff and Cathy Bedford who run a B&B from the White Lion pub in Broad Street said they had lost almost pounds 4,000 because people had not been able to email or call to book rooms.

"We have lost a fortune in the last two weeks," said Cathy, who has run the business for six years.

"I can't take payments, get calls or bookings from the internet. Our mobiles don't have a good enough signal out here either.

"The B&B is always full. I can't remember a time when we have been empty so this has had a really big knockon effect."

Sarah Ascroft, who runs a cleaning and paving business with her husband from their home, said they had also missed out on jobs.

She said: "Without receiving emails, being able to process payments or use my phone lines I have lost business.

People will have gone to our competitors and I can't pay wages either.

"We are cut off in the village anyway but without our phones and internet we are even more cut off and it is very difficult to run a business."

Morris Cox, aged 87, uses an emergency alert button since he fell and injured himself in his garden.

His son, Richard Cox, is now worried something will happen while he is at work.

The 55-year-old said: "I'm not here most of the time because I work nights. I got the alarm to make sure help could get here straight away.

"It's disgusting the village has been put through this huge inconvenience because of some idiots.

"I refuse to pay my bill until we get the line back - why should we pay for a phone we haven't got."

Charles Tew, aged 76, from Potter's Close, added: "We are in sheltered accommodation with no phone line. Next door is a 93-year-old woman on her own and there's a few 80-year-olds in the estate. We pay pounds 8 a week for the emergency button service which we aren't getting."

BT said engineers had been "working round the clock" to get the cables repaired and the service restored.

A spokeswoman added that most residents would see their phone lines back by the end of the week.

She added: "Replacing the stolen cable and reconnecting the affected customers has proved to be a major engineering challenge due to the amount of cable involved, because we are having to replace and reconnect the cable in sections.

"This is a painstaking process and once a section of cable is installed, each customer has to be reconnected one at a time. We are more than half way through the repair.

"It is extremely regrettable when BT suffers any kind of damage to its network. Our priority is always to restore services as quickly as we can."

The company said it was working with Warwickshire Police to prevent cable theft from happening again and would be using Smartwater to deter criminals.

CAPTION(S):

ANGRY: Geoff Bedford and Sarah Ashcroft