A COUPLE who set up camp outside their burnt-out home have been branded "neighbours from hell" by angry residents.

Victor Holt and his wife Marilyn have been living in a tent outside their house in Partridge Hill Street, Padiham, for almost two weeks after refusing to remain in a council-provided home in Burnley, claiming to be victims of anti-social behaviour.

They cannot enter the Padiham house because the fire in January, started by a candle while the couple were asleep, has left ceilings liable to collapse at any time.

Next-door neighbour Freda Latham claimed she had endured 17 years of drunken foul language, fighting, and waste scattered on the couple's land.

She alleged that now the couple were living in the tent, they were causing more trouble, with more rubbish piling up and local children gathering to speak to them.

She said she had been forced to ring police on a number of occasions since they moved into the tent, and officers confirmed they had visited the couple twice this week.

Mrs Latham said: "The kids are attracted to them because they think they're funny - sometimes we have up to 20 of them there.

"A lot of the things they do, including this, might seem funny at first but if you've had to live with it day in and day out for all these years it's not.

"What sort of example are they setting these children, with their language and their drinking? Something needs to be done about them."

Mayor of Padiham Councillor Maureen Whitaker, who met with the couple's neighbours on Tuesday night, said there had been a number of attempts to control the couple, including notices to force them to tidy their land and an anti-social behaviour order, now expired, on Mrs Holt.

But because the couple own the house, the council has not been able to force them to move out, and may now have to give them a grant to repair the home so that they can return to it.

Councillor Whitaker said: "We have lobbied Burnley Council many, many times and things have always fallen down because they own their own property.

"We have been talking to the legal department again to try to explore our options further, and waiting for a response.

"We all agree that it's a very great shame that these two people have got to that level but there is only so much tolerance that can be given.

"The sheer frustration for these neighbours comes from the feeling of impotence - that it seems like nothing can be done.

"Everybody seems to point the finger at other agencies saying it's their problem, but the one continuity is that it's always the neighbours' problem."

Mr and Mrs Holt were unavailable for comment.