A DISABLED woman says she is being forced to use only half her home after social services and council contractors installed a lift too small for her to use.

June Bailey from Wareham has MS and uses a wheelchair.

She can only use the equipment with help from her carer, breaking the lift's 22-stone weight limit.

The mother-of-two from Bere Road said: "I'm suffering because of other people's mistakes.

"This lift was wrong in the first place - it's too small and the council isn't prepared to spend the money to put it right.

"I have had to sleep on the settee in the lounge sometimes but it does not seem to matter to the council. If I have to live downstairs then surely I should only pay half the rent."

She added: "All these people seem to think that because you are in a wheelchair you can't have any brains.

"There needs to be people in wheelchairs working in these offices so that they realise the needs of disabled people."

Nick Coggins, principal housing officer at Purbeck District Council, said: "Our contractors installed the through-floor lift in accordance with specified requests from social services.

"Installing a new external lift shaft would cost in excess of £20,000. As our total budget for disabled council housing alternations is £100,000, I cannot justify that.

"Her argument is she has a house and she should be able to go upstairs but at the end of the day we've already spent thousands of pounds on the property. The property is adequate for her to live on the ground floor.

"One option is to use the lift room as a downstairs bedroom but we are also asking a lift engineer to see if it would be feasible to put in a bigger lift."