A FAMILY embroiled in a two-year legal row with Durham County Council over a defective party wall claim the authority is failing in its legal duty.

Margaret Kelley says she as spent an "extraordinary" amount of money fighting the council over the wall.

Ms Kelley bought the property in Station Road, West Cornforth, in 2012 as a family home for her son, Paul.

However, Mr Kelley moved out shortly afterwards after discovering severe damp in the downstairs walls which he blames for causing his daughter's bronchitis.

The cause of the damp was found to be a defective party wall built when the adjoining end terrace was knocked down by Sedgefield Borough Council as part of a compulsory purchase agreement in the 1970s.

Four decades later and the ownership of the land where the house stood and joint responsibility for the party wall now rests with Durham County Council.

But Mrs Kelley and her son claim the council has failed to come up with a suitable fix for the wall and is allowing the situation to drag on without resolution.

They are also angry that they have been pursued through the courts for council tax for the property when they say it is inhabitable because of the the authority's failings.

Mrs Kelley said: "I don't think we are unreasonable people but the council is being utterly unreasonable. They have a legal duty to repair the wall and they're simply not doing what they are supposed to."

Mrs Kelley said one council official offered £1,500 to draw a line under the matter - which they rejected - claiming the family had carried out poor quality repairs to a chimney stack both parties are responsible for.

The family has taken their fight to the Local Government Ombudsman, their local MPs and the Royal Court of Justice in London, and have finally had the property de-listed from the council tax register.

However, the damp and the defective party wall are still to be resolved.

"All I want is this to be a house we can live in," said Mr Kelley, 35.

In response, Gerard Darby, asset services manager at Durham County Council, said: “We have been working with Ms Kelley to try and resolve the issues that she has raised and we are committed to continuing our discussions with her to try and reach an amicable resolution.”