A PIECE of land is attracting vermin and illegal flytipping after it was allowed to become overgrown, a resident claims.

Tendring Council has been criticised for failing to act and mow the grass on the patch of land in Garden Road, Jaywick.

Carol Armitage said she first raised the issue in July, but is still waiting for council contractors to do the job.

The grass was meant to be cut last week, but again the work has been delayed.

Mrs Armitage, of Garden Road, said the land has been a problem for 17 years and said it was left to residents to force the issue and push for enforcement notices so the grass can be cut.

She said: “It is an on-going problem. It is not fair on the area and it is not fair on the people that live here.

“I would like to know what the council is going to do in future.”

She said the land was given to Tendring Council by Jaywick’s founder, Frank Stedman, as a recreation area.

He placed a legal covenant on the land, forbidding any building work on it.

Since then it has passed into private ownership, but Mrs Armitage would like to see it acquired by the council again which could maintain it as a public recreation space.

She added: “Something has got to be done. They can’t just keep ignoring it.”

Nigel Brown, Tendring Council’s communications manager, said the council had lined-up a contractor who had been due to cut the grass last week.

He said: “For various reasons that was not possible, but the work is due to be carried out by the end of this week.

“The council is also negotiating with the landowner in an attempt to set up an agreement whereby this site is cut at the same time as when the council cuts the two plots either side of it.”

Mr Brown added the council has no legal power to force the landowner to agree to such a contract and should he not do so, the council will need to serve an enforcement notice as has been the case this year.