A MUM who left a women's refuge for a new life in Dorchester says her house is not fit to bring children up in.

Samantha McCartney, who lives in Alington Road, fled her ex-husband because he was violent towards her and she worried he would snatch the children.

She came to Dorset in the hope of giving Patricia, 10, Gloria, eight and six-year-old Eric a new start near her family.

But before she moved in last February, Magna rated her three-bedroom social housing home as being in a 'poor condition' and the mum-of-three is at her wits' end still waiting for more than 17 major jobs to be carried out.

Mrs McCartney claims she can stick her fingers through a hole in the window frame, has suffered two floods, dodgy electric wiring, asbestos in the garden, cracks in the ceiling, a leaking overflow, broken bathroom tiles, no central heating and a hole in her front path.

She says Magna sent her letters demanding an answer within 24 hours when she was at the bedside of her daughter who lay in hospital suffering from pneumonia and a collapsed lung.

Mrs McCartney, 33, said: "I have come to the end of my tether, I feel like the place is coming down round my ears.

"My kids have been through enough this year and so have I - I cannot make a home for them here, not after being in a refuge for eight months.

"They do a couple of jobs to keep me quiet when I start screaming and shouting, and then they just abandon me again."

Magna's head of building services, Trea Murphy, said: "There is a large number of repairs that have been carried out at that address, and others which were delayed.

"After I spent three hours with Mrs McCartney she showed me more which need to be done.

"Her house is getting high priority attention and I am very keen to sort it out as far as possible.

"A new central heating system is being installed, and after that the other things can get started."